Because I'm profoundly irritated, I need to say this:
Fuck you, Mike Huckabee!
That's better. The last thing we need to have done to our Constitution is have it in "God's standards", as he he would have it.
"I have opponents in this race who do not want to change the Constitution," Huckabee told a Michigan audience on Monday. "But I believe it's a lot easier to change the Constitution than it would be to change the word of the living god. And that's what we need to do -- to amend the Constitution so it's in God's standards rather than try to change God's standards so it lines up with some contemporary view."
What a complete scumbag. Are we going to have an amendment banning the consumption of shellfish and the wearing of polyester-cotton blends? One that puts unruly children to death? Yeah, our contemporary mores on these issues are woefully lacking in comparison to those of desert tribes a few millennia ago who gave the big thumbs up to slavery and subjugation of women.
I give Huckabee credit, though, for acknowledging that the Constitution doesn't give quarter to his imaginary friend Yahweh. This stands in stark contrast to Ron Paul who reads our founding document only to find it "replete with references to God". Is Paul that stupid or was he just lying? Look at the original or peruse a transcript and you'll see Yahweh is not given credit for or seen as a source of the legitimacy of our government. Indeed, the Bible had little or no direct influence on the Declaration of Independence nor the Constitution:
In a May 8, 1825 letter to Henry Lee, Jefferson identifies his sources for the Declaration’s principles. He names as sources: Aristotle, Cicero, Locke, and (Algernon) Sidney — he does not mention the Bible. Then again, the terminology in the Declaration is not specifically Christian — or even biblical, with the exception of “Creator.” The term “providence” is never used of God in the Bible, nor are “nature’s God” or “Supreme Judge of the world” ever used in the Bible.
In the hundreds of pages comprising Madison’s notes on the constitutional convention (and those of the others who kept notes), there is no mention of biblical passages/verses in the debates/discussions on the various parts and principles of the Constitution. They mention Rome, Sparta, German confederacies, Montesquieu, and a number of other sources — but no Scripture verses.
In The Federalist Papers, there is no mention of biblical sources for any of the Constitution’s principles, either — one would think they could squeeze them in among the 85 essays if they were, indeed, the sources; especially since the audience was common men who were familiar with, and had respect for, the Bible. The word “God” is used twice — and one of those is a reference to the pagan gods of ancient Greece. “Almighty” is used twice and “providence” three times — but neither is ever used in connection with any constitutional principle or influence. The Bible is not mentioned.
If you follow politics, you no doubt have heard the brouhaha surrounding the contemptible excerpts from Ron Paul's newsletters recently published in The New Republic. UW Professor Lester Hunt defends Paul in his latest blog entry. He takes the author of TNR piece, James Kirchick, to task for exaggerating:
It seems to me that the evidence he cites, though it may be decades old, isn't decades long…But as near as I can determine they are all from a time period of four or five years, from some time in 1989 to some time in 1994. That is also true of all the offensive comments that libertarian journalist Dan Koffler cites here.
Sure, that Paul's underlings printed patently odious commentary for 5 years is better than it having gone on for 20 but at some point something like a law of diminishing returns must kick in. Had it gone on for a few months or, since I'm feeling charitable, a year, it would be one thing. It would be excusable to me. But 5?! Five years is still a long time. At best, Paul is guilty of exceptionally gross negligence. Did he ever personally pen a retraction in his newsletter once he found out what was being printed in his name?
Hunt also quotes Paul on racism:
Racism is simply an ugly form of collectivism, the mindset that views humans strictly as members of groups rather than as individuals. Racists believe that all individuals who share superficial physical characteristics are alike: as collectivists, racists think only in terms of groups.
Paul reiterated this view a couple weeks ago on Bill Moyers Journal:
And, you know, libertarianism is the enemy of all racism, because racism is a collectivist idea is that you put people in categories. You say, "Well, Blacks belong here, Whites here, and women here." Well, we don't see people in form-- or gays. You don't have rights because you're gays, or women, or minorities. You have rights because you're an individual. So, we see people strictly as individuals. And we get these individuals in a natural way. So, it's exactly opposite of all collectivism. And it's absolutely anti-racism, because we don't see in those terms.
Hunt appears to buy this notion that libertarians are some über-moralists for whom it is just impossible to be racist. What a load of bullshit. Perhaps Paul and Hunt simply define libertarianism is a very narrow way but, more likely, they set up a false dichotomy where you are either a collectivist or individualist with no middle ground, no potential to have leanings in both directions. Does anyone else find this "either you're one of us or one of them" mentality to be disturbing? I also find it to be hypocritical in light of the quote above about the Constitution. It comes from a screed defending Christians from that evil straw man seeking to destroy Christmas. Is Paul really oblivious to the fact that Christianity is a collectivist institution and that churches and religious holidays are instruments of it?
One of the things that irritates me about the way Paul and others formulate libertarianism is that they ignore how all of their talk about rights and the primacy of the individual are propped up and enforced by collectivism. When you say you want a limited government, you are also saying that you want collectivist institutions (a law enforcement apparatus and a judiciary) to ensure your individual rights. Here we see freedom being preserved by collectivism.
I use "collectivist" and "collectivism" because Paul has. But surely they are loaded with the baggage of the Soviet Union. Semantics aside, I think that communitarians such as Robert Bellah have some interesting critiques of rather extreme individualism. While I'm not a full-blooded communitarian, I appreciate it that the philosophy acknowledges that we are more than individuals and that we don't come into existence in a vacuum. We are born into a form of collectivism known as the family. In case the people who have pictures of Ayn Rand on their mantelpieces have forgotten, we're apes. We evolved into a very social(tribal?) creature. Ants have colonies and we have metropolises like Tokyo and Chicago. No one is or ever was born into a position where they could peruse a social contract. Look around and you'll see members of homo sapiens constantly striving for contact with other members – social networking sites, personal ads, taverns, union halls, cafes, clubs, social organizations, the family, communities, states, counties, countries – we live to be with others. This is not to say that the concepts of individualism and autonomy aren't important because they most certainly are. Human beings getting together and forming groups is almost our raison d'etre. We build our identities, in great measure, by associations with other people. This is not to say that every instance of identifying someone as a part of a particular group is good. Take racism, for example. But for Ron Paul to speak as if people coming together and forming groups is a priori horrendous is just absurd.
While I agree with some elements of Paul's platform, I think he has some truly awful bedfellows, is untrustworthy, and adheres to a philosophy which I find unsound and unsatisfactory.
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