The Superiority of Voting For Principle Over Not Voting at All
As I have said in comments on several other blogs, I felt the that the most principled vote for libertarians and paleoconservatives in 2008 was for Chuck Baldwin. Many in these philosophical camps have advocating not exercising the franchise, faced with the choice of a left-socialist and a right-socialist. However not voting, which leaves no trace, doesn’t suffice to register a protest. It will be interesting to see what the total votes of third parties will come out to in the next couple of days. A high vote would express a dissastisfaction with the present two party system. On the other hand a non-vote could be interpreted as either apathy or protest, an ambiguity which of course the supporters of the system would interpret to their advantage.
As much as I respect the persons and positions of the non-vote strategists, this is likely to be a bad year for them. This campaign has generated tremendous energy, particularly among the Obama side, but also among the Republican base after the nomination of Sarah Palin as McCain’s running mate. Hopes that a mounting historical trend of nonparticipation in the electoral process would delegitimate the political system are likely to be dashed in the immediate future.
About Baldwin I have no regrets. The Constitution party is a half-baked idea who’s time has yet to come, and probably never will as long at it is run by factuous amatures. But Baldwin addressed issues with dignity and using the rhetorical conventions which were once the halmark of the American republic. Even on those issues where I disagree with him he has argued with logical coherence…never pandering to his audience, but rather trying to evoke in them a renewed committment to higher principles. In short, a political strategy which is guaranteed to result in defeat, since it over-, rather than underestimates the intelligence and morality of the electorate. John McCain has persued the opposite strategy…and he is going down in defeat anyway…taking his honor with him.
For that reason I don’t consider my vote for the Baldwin/Castle ticket wasted…quite the opposite!
The “remnant”
It seems as if everybody is a “libertarian” these days. Have you ever smoked pot…you’re a libertarian. Do you want to pay less taxes? You’re a libertarian. Do you think that after bailing out the financial class to the tune of 700 billion (which they maintain is necessary to avoid a crash) some inquiries should be made as to the propriety of golden parachutes? Congratulations, you’re a libertarian!
Libertarinanism is mainstream today. Ask Bob Barr…who thinks the US military should get out of Iraq…but not necessarily Pakistan or Colombia. Ask Tyler Cowen who thinks government should be allowed to expand at or less than the rate of growth of GNP. (With negative growth, that may be a proposal for drastic reduction in the near future!) Ask Joe the Plumber! And these are the good guys!
In contrast, a bad guy would, I suppose, be Alan Greenspan who masqueraded as both an economist and a libertarian on the strength of his personal relationship (not as tight as Nathaniel Brandon’s, but good enough) with Ayn Rand. Thank you Mr. Greenspan for almost single handedly destroying the American economy! No, we don’t expect you to know anything about the Austrian bussiness cycle theory…because you never studied Austrian economics. But you are a self described classical liberal aka “libertarian”…can you define that?
The oracle replies, “Yes, a classical liberal is someone who, at least at heart, thinks that it is best for the banks to maintain low interest rates.”
Thank you, we are astounded and illuminated, to the extent that we have no reply….except….
True Libertainism
(Or classical liberalism, if you will) is the belief that there is a natural law which superceeds any law promulgated by a parliament, congress, or diet. If a legislative body passes a law which, say, permits anyone to murder someone with red hair, then, according to a libertarian, that law is immediately void. It is not voided by judicial review. The extra-natural law edict is a dead letter and of no force.
The principle of obedience to natural law is, I humbly submit, of more fundamental importance than low interest rates, or even the principle on loans!
The mainstream libertarians are for the most part utilitarians, tinkering with the notion of limiting a government which has long since gone beyond any sane limit in terms of expenditure, infringement of civil rights, or executive centralization. Only a small “remnant”, to use the phrase of Albert J. Nock, has the historical perspective to realized that the natural law justification of the state has long since been violated.
The Man and the Party
The closest thing to a libertarian party in existence today is the Constitution Party, which is fielding the Baldwin/Castle ticket in this season’s presidential contest. There is a certain amount of odium attached to this party from the perspective of libertarians. It is rumored that it is a stalking horse for theocrats. But hold your Savanarolas a minute and take a look at the facts.
Yes, at one time there was a “theocrat problem” in the Constitution party. There was a point at which an extremist wing was trying to purge the party of all but Protestant fundamenalists. These people lost and they lost big. Today the Baldwin/Castle ticket is canvasing the support of all people of good will…Protestant, Catholic, Mormon, Jew….Righteous Atheist….anybody!
Like Thomas Aquinas seven hundred years earlier, Chuck Baldwin recognizes the existence of two layers of truth, natural and revealed. Whether god is a unity or a trinity, what direction to pray in, and the number of divine commandments, if any, are theological questions which can only be answered within the context of particular faith communities. However the existence of natural law, the inviolability of the person and property of one’s neighbor, is a manifest truth which doesn’t require faith in a theological sense. It is this principle of natural law, not any sectarian confession, which the Baldwin campaign stands for.
All the other parties are pushing utilitarian theories in accordance with the class interests which they represent. So what do you want…low interest rates, high interest rates….or are you acutally interested in in truth and justice? If the latter you are one of the “remnant” who will be voting for Chuck Baldwin this season.
You may not be voting for a winner, but to borrow another phrase from Albert J. Nock, you’ll be “Doing the right thing!”
“The Lesser of Two Goods”
Author and writer on moral theology Lawrence Vance has penned an incisive analysis of presidential candidate Chuck Baldwin’s politics on the Lew Rockwell site:
http://www.lewrockwell.com/vance/vance151.html
I would like to say that this is an endorsement by Vance of Baldwin, but for technical reasons only fully comprehensible to theologians in Pensacola FL, Vance eschews the formal term “endorsement.”
Let’s face it, for us ordinary sinners (libertarians and whatnot) Pensacola FL is a pretty scary place, stuck as it is out on the Gulf Coast between the hard place of military discipline and hard rock of its flourishing and fundamental churches. So Mr. (I think he is a lay-theologian not a Rev.) Vance has come to the aid of us backsliders and philistines, with the assurance that his fellow Pensacolan not only has no intentions of establishing the Kingdom of God by edict…but that his version of liberty under the constitution is actually more reasonable and practical than anything that the Libertarian Party has managed to come up with in recent history.
Let’s face it, a lot of hand holding and reassurance is in order. If you have ever been to Pensacola you’ll realize that it is nothing so much as a miniaturized and modernized version of ancient Constantinople. It was said that in Constantinople of the fifth century that if you went to a baker, in stead of the price of bread you would have to defend your understanding of the Trinity, if you went to a barber the small talk was all about the economy of the Incarnation, and if you had your shoes repaired you were liable to stumble on the cobbler’s opinion on valid apostolic succession. Likewise a rigorous Pensacola lay-theologian like Lawrence Vance does not allow loose language like “endorsement” to pass his lips, for it might put the rest of us under obligation to vote for Chuck Baldwin at penalty of near-mortal sin.
Endorsement or none, one gets a very edifying view of Baldwin from Vance’s article. Interestingly enough the two Pensacolans are not close friends, which eliminates the “favor” factor. And Vance being Vance: he rails against military service in wartime as intrinsically evil and sinful…that in a town crawling with naval service men, we can eliminate the “fear” factor as well! So Vance’s quasi-endorsement (remember the Ron Paul’s was really only “qausi” as well) is not only made without fear or favor…but is an attempt to overcome fear itself. The fear, by libertarians, of Pensacola Baptists.
Given that our choice in the major parties is between a stealth Socialist and an aging bipolar militarist, it is time to confront our fears. So listen all you lifestyle libertarians out there, take a swig of Jack Daniels or a puff of marijuana, screw up your courage and vote for the preacher man!
The republic you save may be your own.
WWJD vs. WWHLMD
I was hoping to hear more from Chuck Baldwin, who was scheduled for an interview on the Gary Baumgarten show, but the Constitution Party candidate for the American presidency failed to appear, creating a minor “snubgate” on Baumgarten’s air time. Recall that I, like many Ron Paul enthusiasts, am supporting the candidacy of Rev. Baldwin in part because of the shoddy treatment given to Dr. Paul by another third party candidate. No, I am not switching back to Bob Barr of the Libertarian party, but I am saddened that Rev. Baldwin was not able to get the kind of exposure which the rough and tumble of an open on-line mike would have provided. I believe that he would have acquitted himself well…but then of course I can only speculate.
In the absence of Rev. Baldwin, the show was reduced to a generalized discussion of the prospects of third parties in American politics. The only way that Mr. Baumgarden could maintain a focus for discussion was by invoking discussion of the more odiously theocratic points of the Constitution party’s preamble. At that point the die was cast, and the tone of the discussion became increasingly critical, or at least dismissive of the Baldwin candidacy.
Personally I think a secularist can vote for Chuck Baldwin in good conscience, if by a secularist we mean someone who believes in the separation of church and state. It is true that the platform of the Constitution party has definite theocratic overtones, but (as was pointed out on the show) Rev. Baldwin is using the Constitution party as a vehicle for his candidacy, and independents or members of other parties (such as myself) are voting for the man, not the party platform. So the question becomes: what kind of man is this?
That is one reason why Baldwin’s no-show was so disappointing…I think he would have represented himself much better than a mechanical interpretation of his party’s platform. None the less, Chuck Baldwin has written extensively on a wide variety of topics, and there is nothing difficult about getting a well rounded acquaintance with his views, which are posted on many Internet venues, including, but not limited to, that of the Constitution party, the Baldwin/Castle campaign, and the home site of the Crossroads Baptist Church in Pensacola FL.
At the outset there is much material which would not sit well with anyone who is not a fundamentalist protestant Christian. For example, it emerges that Rev. Baldwin was closely mentored by the famous (or infamous, depending on one’s point of view) Rev. Jerry Falwell in his formative years, being a member of the first graduating class from Falwell’s Liberty University in Lynchburg VA.
Personally, I could never have voted for Jerry Falwell if he had decided to run for President of the United States of America. Theological questions by themselves would have made me skeptical of him. But the proper question here is not WWJD (What would Jesus do?)…because if you wait to vote for a politician who is in 100% of agreement with one’s theological and moral beliefs one is likely to forfeit the franchise entirely! For better or worse, modern democracies work on the principle of theological compromise. We who believe in religion find ourselves in the position of the monarchists during the French 3rd Republic. They could never agree among themselves which king to restore…the prince of Bourbon, of Orleans, or of the Bonapartists. In the end they had to admit: “a republic divides us least!”
Likewise, even those of us who put religion at the center of our personal life find out sooner or later that “a secular republic divides us least.” In the political sphere we can’t afford to think in terms of what a perfect man would choose to create a perfect society. We have to lower our sights and contemplate what a flawed man, albeit a flawed man who wanted to live in reasonable harmony and cooperation with others, would choose. I can’t think of anyone more flawed, more secular or more tolerant than H.L.Mencken…and if we go off the political gold standard of theocracy and regroup around the silver standard of a libertarian commonwealth, such as Menken might have approved of…then we will be doing well, since the realistic alternative is the fiat standard by which a dictatorship of social engineering and radical egalitarianism will gradually install itself. We would do well to ask ourselves WWHLMD: What Would H.L.Mencken do?
While it is quite impossible to imagine H.L. Mencken as a Jerry Falwell enthusiast, Chuck Baldwin and his mentor are very distinct people. Granted, the difference in their style of thinking is so nuanced that most secularists will have neither the patience or the inclination to discover it. It would be like asking people who have no interest in Christian theology to explain the difference between Augustine and Aquinas…yet as with the ancient doctors of religion, these modern preachers harbor some very fundamental differences, albeit the latter being partially dependent on the former. It would seem that Baldwin, in contrast to the snap-judgements which some evangelical pastors, notably Falwell, have occasionally confounded with the certitude of faith, has deliberated long and hard (he would probably say prayerfully) on the question of what a just political society would look like…and this reflection has brought him an authentic appreciation of what might be called “liberalism” in the sense that Hayek, or Mencken, might have used the term. Needless to say, “liberalism” is not a term which Baldwin uses, for his views have nothing to do with either the social liberalism of the Democrats, or the lifestyle libertarianism of those who have usurped the term. But the essentials are all there: peace in foreign relations and minimal government at home. This is an abbreviated version of the Ron Paul program…and by extension something which a latter day H.L. Mencken could embrace.
But what about all that odious theocratic stuff in the party platform? First of all, we ought to recognize by now that party platforms are more often honored in the breach than upheld as guides to policy. It is the man, not the document, which should be our concern. None the less, we can re-frame that concern by asking if an evangelical pastor, once launched on the stage of national politics, can be anything else but a demagogue. Certainly Falwell came across as a demagogue to his antagonists. However Baldwin has evolved beyond Falwell’s rhetoric of public accusation, and has honed the fine art of enunciating moral principles in irenic and reasoned tones. When a pastor enters politics, whatever his views on the establishment of religion might be, he dooms himself if he fails to understand the separation of his church pulpit from public fora. There must be two ways of speaking, one of which must remain strictly confined to the congregation and the denomination to which he ministers. From the evidence that I have seen so far, it appears that Baldwin has mastered the art of reasoned public discourse, a mastery which is certainly superior to John McCain’s, and rivals even that of the supposedly flawless Obama. Again, it would have been interesting to hear Baldwin’s response to the rough and tumble online at the Baumgarten show, if only to verify the Baptist preacher’s facility at turning the rhetorical cheek.
Like all virtues, the Rev. Baldwin’s (at least hitherto) irenicism comes with a price tag. We are now at turning point in American history, one at which the art of populist demagoguery is likely to experience a grand revival. I would love to hear Chuck Baldwin torch the beneficiaries of the 700 billion dollar bailout in the same hellfire and brimstone accents that he uses when he denounces the rich elites in his church. Moreover, a lot can happen in the month before the election, and we may still see this champion of the Lord, slingshot in hand, march out to challenge the Goliaths which now have this nation in their loathsome grips.
If that should happen, I would hope that our gentle secularists will not take fright. After all, it is certainly true that Rev. Baldwin is a kind of “extremist” and there are all sorts of excuses for not giving him one’s fullest support. Why, according to our latter-day follower of Mencken, should I support Baldwin who I agree with only 60% of the time, when I could support Barr who I agree with 90% of the time? Why indeed, except to put a premium on solidity and constancy, since Barr’s convictions may change tomorrow while Baldwin is a solid, and perchance as stubborn, as a rock.
So what would H.L. Mencken do in 2008? Of course I don’t know. Perhaps he wouldn’t vote at all, which is a legitimate reaction to the political realities of this election where our choices have been so dictated and circumscribed. But I wouldn’t put it past him to vote for a southern evangelical populist, someone akin to his great courtroom charactature of William Jennings Bryan. I suspect this could happen, not just because Mencken was an eccentric, and eccentrics take delight in doing the unexpected, but because we are now in the odd situation where a candidate fielded by a nominally theocratic party offers a platform which is closer to the original program of Menckenian libertarianism than any other ticket, including, disgracefully enough, the Libertarian party itself.
Jesus and Mencken voting for the same ticket? Will miracles never cease? I’ll bet’cha Chuck Baldwin thinks they won’t!
A Scholar and a Gentleman goes Ballistic “American Gothic” in Response the Sellout
Yes, the House has capitulated to the new, improved, pork laced version of the bailout bill. Proving, with Euclidean clarity, that the American political system no longer represents the people but is beholden to the financial elites (plus some other elites, oil, military…the list goes on.)
Economist and scholar Thomas DiLorenzo, writing on the Lew Rockwell blog has expressed a reaction that goes a tad beyond his usual mild (guffaw) scholarly rebuffs of the federal state:
“I just returned from Home Depot where I bought the biggest pitchfork that they had. I’m soaking some rags with kerosine, to be wrapped around a broom handle and then set on fire. Then I’m heading down to the Baltimore-Washington parkway to D.C.. I’m hoping a large crowd will follow my example.”
Unfortunately I live far from the Baltimore-Washington D.C. parkway…but if the weather is as nice there as it is here today it would be a wonderful time to go for a stroll!
These days, in lieu of a presidential race, many Paulistas are putting their energies into other venues. This is one clear statement which is being circulated at present:
To: U.S. Congress
We the People of the United States of America; have repeatedly been witness to continuous violations of our rights and freedoms guaranteed by The United States Constitution. Article 6 of the Constitution states that said Constitution “shall be the Supreme Law of the land”, yet this is repeatedly disregarded and/or ignored by the legislative and Executive branches of our Government. This once great republic and her Constitution has been usurped by power and greed for the benefit of a few and the detriment of many. The Constitution was written to avoid the pitfalls of autocracy (absolute government by one person) and democracy (mob rule, one vote system); it was written for a confederated republic, which is a three vote system designed to check tyranny.
Our elected representatives, have ignored the will of the people who they were sent to represent. Our letters, faxes, e-mails and phone calls have fallen on deaf ears. We retain the power to have and elect representative government and “when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty to throw off such Government…” (Dec. 7/4/1776)
It has been decreed and is explicitly stated, as follows that:
“All laws which are repugnant to the Constitution are null and void” (Marbury vs. Madison. 5 US (2 Cranch) 137,174,176, (1803)
“Where rights secured by the Constitution are involved, there can be no rule making or legislation which would abrogate them.” (Miranda vs. Arizona, 384 US 436 p.491.)
“An Unconstitutional Act is not law; it confers no rights: it imposes no duties; affords no protection; it creates no office; it is in legal contemplation, as inoperative as though it had never been passed.” (Norton vs. Shelby County 118 US 425 p.442)
The Constitution and the Bill of Rights, entail much more than a piece of paper. The document’s intentions and meanings are clearly put forth in the Annals of Congress, The Congressional Globe and the Congressional Record, by our founding fathers.
We the People demand that the Constitution of the United States and The Bill of Rights be strictly adhered to by those we elect to Federal Office. We remind you that the citizens of this republic are your employers and any continued abrogation and usurpation of the protections and guaranteed rights enumerated in the Constitution and Bill of Rights will result in your dismissal.
Sincerely,
Friends of Ron Paul in Japan et al…
“Friends of Ron Paul” has been away from the keyboard for a while engaged in a variety time consuming tasks at the day job, including being a full-time administrator of Confucian scholarly examinations. But we have kept our eyes on the early primaries, and the prospects of a Ron Paul Presidency.
In all candor, we are not pleased. 10, 6, 4, 3… Is that the Fibbonaci series in reverse? No, it’s the percentage of the Ron Paul vote in the Republican primaries and caucuses of the Midwest, East, and South. Well, there was that 15% in Nevada…but let’s face it, that’s the place where even the most conservative people turn into high-rollers. He should have done better. See my post on “The New Hamsters” regarding various hytheses as to why the Ron Paul revolution hasn’t spread further from its determined and heroic hard core.
So where to we go from here? Well, there are still a few credible Paulistas who can smell the fresh cut grass of the White House lawn, I wish them well…and I want some of whatever it is they are smoking! The plausibility of this kind of scenario hinges on the prospect of all the other candidates droping out until only Paul and the front-runner are left standing, with Paul finally coming into his rightful share of media publicity. Even a three person race is no good, since it only takes two to tango and we all know what happened to Edwards. But would even a two person race before the Republican national convention generate publicity for the good doctor. Knowing the mainstream media as we do, isn’t it far more likely that they would simply annoint the front-runner and set up more encounters between him and the Democrats, skipping any intra-Republican politicking?
So what about the third party gambit. First of all, Dr. No has said “no” to that one from the start and his wishes should be honnored. But of course, if it is down to two neo-conservative/neo-liberal big-spending, executive expanding, warmongers, no self-respecting Paulist could vote for either party…so the third party gambit is an option to be held in reserve.
Fortunately there is another posibility which is quite plausable. This is the prospect of a hung convention more or less evenly ballanced between a McCain and a Romney block. In this case a third force could play the role of a kingmaker. Unfortunately Huckabee would like to play that role, shutting out Paul again. It all depends on how the mathematics sum up after Super Tuesday. If Huckabee’s votes when factored in to those of the weaker candidate (of course he gains less clout supporting the stronger candidate) still fall short of the winning number by a margin less than the strength of the Paul block, then Paul becomes the kingmaker. This doesn’t mean that Paul himself would become president…it just means that he would have an indefinate amount of time to educate the Republicans holed up in the Twin Cities as to how they could win a national election using honest and ethical means. It could actually result in an attractive Republican candidate…say Hagel of Nebraska, or Olympia Snow of Maine…the latter being the perfect antidote to Hillary!
But all of this is speculation, if not quite “idle” speculation. Now its crunch time for Paulists campaigning in the remaining states. Afterwards we’ll have to see how the numbers turned out on Super Tuesday. Until then anyone interested in mathematical games would do better with the Fibbonaci series.
This is the most cogent and concise declaration of the reasons for supporting Ron Paul’s bid for the U.S. Presidency which has yet come to my attention. It appeared as an ad in the New York Times, succeeding another one in USA Today…to which expense the monetary figure referes. I hope it will be widely disseminated and thatAd Supporting Ron Paul by Lawrence W. Lepard we can get some translation of it into other languages.
A Decent Respect for the opinions of mankind…
Thus read a famous declaration written in July of 1776. Thomas Jefferson was trying to explain to the world what “causes impelled the separation” of the British American colonies from their homeland. Generally speaking, demands for epochal political changes should be few and far between. In every generation there will be born troublemakers, as well as people who are rightly concerned that their political situation demands radical reform. The problem is to separate hysteria from hope, well thought out principle from mindless agitation. That was why Jefferson was commissioned to write the Declaration of Independence in that summer of 1776, not to convince his countrymen, who were already pretty much decided, but to convince the peoples of the world that the British American colonists had not suddenly gone mad. Of course it was King George who had gone mad…not Jefferson or Paine or Samuel Adams, but that might not have been so clear to contemporaries as it is we who have the perspective of history behind us. In particular it might not have been so clear to the conservative French nobility, for whom the world “rebellion” was a dirty word. Yet the French would soon enter into the American side of the conflict…and not the least of the reasons for their support must have been the calm, reasoned appeals which issued from the pen of Jefferson.
Today a new revolution is stirring in America under the leadership of Congressman Ron Paul of Texas. It is a revolution which intends to triumph through the ballot box rather than through force, and one which intends to reinstate the rights of many while infringing on those of none. Yet, for all of that it is a radical movement, and there are many temperamental conservatives who fear anything which smacks of radicalism. It is for this reason that a “decent respect” for the opinions of mankind, impels us to explain in plain language to the world why this “revolution” is no threat, but rather a potential boon, to the generality of mankind worldwide.
To begin with, let’s see just what this “revolution” entails. Ron Paul’s revolution is enigmatic in the sense that its sole demand is a return to constitutional government. Surely a demand for return to constitutional government is a conservative, not a radical, proposition! However when one considers the reality of American history, such a demand is in fact radical in the truest sense. This is because of the subtle and unique way in which semi-unitary government was imposed on the United States. A forgotten writer of the first half of the 20th century, Garet Garrett by name, called this political development “revolution within the form.”
What is “revolution within the form” and why does Ron Paul want to have a second revolution to reinstate the original form? Let’s make a simple comparison between political systems, again making mention of France…this time the France of the 20th century. French society during the time of the Third Republic and that of the Fifth Republic has changed radically, and American society has changed even more radically during the same period. However what makes America odd is that its constitution has not changed in the same way that of France, or any other “normal” nation has changed. Of course the American political system has undergone vast changes, but these changes have never been submitted any constitutional referenda. Rather they have evolved through largely unnoticed shifts in the meanings of the original compact which stood at the basis of American political life. They have been imposed by administrative and judicial cabals operating out of sight of democratic process. Furthermore the process has been gradual, always being justified by some noble pretext, such as class or racial justice, or a struggle against a relentless external enemy. Many people would be willing to give up a little freedom to attain some noble end, but the process has taken on a dynamic of itself. First the New Deal of FDR, then the National Security State of Truman, then JFK’s New Frontier followed by Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society…all the way up to the present and George W. Bush’s Homeland Security State, the common denominator of all these diverse causes being the increasing preponderance of the federal government over civil society and local community.
Even if the advocates of unitary government were right, in their belief that the exigencies of modern society require centralization and control, would it not behoove them to submit their plans to democratic approval? But of course they have never done that, knowing that they would never get any such mandate! Instead Americans have the form of the 1787 constitution, with the substance of domestic socialism and aggressive projection of power abroad. The separate branches of government, as well as the distinctions between the federal government and the states, continue to exist, but they no longer function in the way that the founders intended. This is “revolution within the form.”
What Ron Paul wants is no more, and no less, radical than honesty. According to the ancient principle of “a government of laws and not men,” we need a government which at least abides by the highest law of the land, the Constitution. This is a universal principle that people of all nations should be able to recognize. Indeed it is so universal that even the most fanatical centralizers, the advocates of the “unitary executive” should be expected to recognize it. If they are consistent they should propose a constitution like the one which DeGaul wrote for the Fifth republic…a unitary constitution with executive primacy. They should propose it and see if the American people would stand for it.
Of course they won’t, because they are trying to get the same thing through the issue endless executive, administrative and judicial writs. Ron Paul is one of the few who is trying to hold them to the letter of the law, and the only one who is running for president in 2008. All American citizens should support him, and should endeavor to explain to all throughout the world who are not American citizens that this is more than just a political choice…it is a moral imperative. A decent respect for the opinions of mankind demands no less.
