Constraining Obama
[BUMPED UP]
I’ve got a new article up at PJ, entitled “Constraining Obama.” It’s about Obama (natch), the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, and natural rights vs. legal rights.
The New Neo
A blog about political change, among other things
“I am constrained, as they are constrained, by a system that our Founders put in place. ”
Constrained to defend our borders.
Constrained to defend DOMA.
Constrained to defend our constitutional rights.
I don’t think he’s chafing much.
And yes, it’s hard to defend these rights without recognizing that their source is Someone greater than us, else what is the source of those rights?
Were Obama honest, he would say that the source of our rights comes from the lowest denominator of group consensus. The group being best led by the left’s elite of course.
In plainer words, our rights in his view extend from the whim of the mob, as directed by its demagogue.
If our rights do not come from God, all that is left is the law of the jungle. For personal opinion has only the currency that might has made right.
“Were Obama honest,”…
If only pigs could fly…
Obama’s notions and historic outlook on the Constitution are about as far removed from the Framers as one would expect from a collectivist know everything. The Founders were as dubious about human nature and government as men could be. There primary purpose in constructing a government was not the best government but the preservation of freedom. Obama is par excellence of just what the Founders desired to protect against.
The entire point of checks and balances – the three branches, two divisions (Fed, State), Constitutional limitiations i.e., enumerated powers, unalienable rights, difficult amendment process, and the limited franchise – was in great part to protect against benefits voting; in other words, against the present state of the state and the present president. The Framers’ worst nightmare and demon has come to pass.
As to O’s repeatedly excising ‘Creator’ from his references, it does me good to see it recognized that there are more malevolent motivations to Obama than one would think likely.
Suppose one fellow says “Human nature does not exist” and another fellow says with equal clarity “Human nature does exist”. Which of the two would be said to be “dubious of human nature”?
“Dubious of human beings”, sure, the fellow asserting the existence of human nature might be highly dubious of a human being standing before him, for his view of human nature may entail a manifold “shiftiness” or “self-regarding” in a man, an inclination to do injustice where the actor [a man] may believe he can “get away with it”. But this believer in human nature may be very little doubtful that there is a human nature, though he may not be capable of accounting fully how that human nature comes about [laws of nature and nature’s God — see the slipperiness?]
Whereas the fellow asserting that there is no such thing as human nature (to say nothing of God, or even nature as such)? He doubts it altogether! He is like Obama.
Freedoms are never granted, only taken.
Neo, you might have went out on a limb here using the term “natch.” Was this a subtle ebonics slam? There appears to be no reason for shortening the word “naturally” because there’s not reason to even remind us it’s about Obama. Of course it’s about Obama (natch).
I think you meant something else by its inclusion but I am at a loss for what it might be except for a comment on the all pervasive attention that moron is getting (natch). My adverb would be “Oh shit, not again, please help us G-d, from talking about this man.)
I continue to admire your courage, Neo.
It’s finally dawning on me that for the past 80 years or so we in the West have been more or less at war over whether the insights of the Enlightenment will be preserved and protected or whether they will be repudiated and replaced by tribalistic collectivism and totalitarianism. There have been respites and truces; and battles have been won ( e.g., WWII) and lost (e.g. the 60’s and 2008-present ) but the war goes ever on.
I guess there’s a silver lining: we may be suffering through a losing streak in the battles that have been raging since 2008, but at least we haven’t yet lost the war.
But that said, we’ve been very hard-pressed, no? We need our own Winston Churchill!
carl in atlanta, 1:14 pm:
” . . . but at least we haven’t yet lost the war.”
I wish I could beliieve that.
Please, someone, help me believe that.
“beliieve” = believe
The refusal to acknowledge a creator is a shibboleth for the left: ya just don’t talk “God”, ya know?
In lesser fashion, among religious Christians, who tend right these days, inviting God and Christ into a conversation can be pretty de riguer. It’s just part of their conversation, as natural as saying “a” or “the”. Also a shibboleth? Or a genuine acknowledgment of something very real to them?
Getting back to the incumbent president, I’m suggesting that that’s just how committed lefties speak. God is not normally part of the conversation — because a very real and ^present^ God is not normally part of the thought process:
Not normally part, but is mentioned from time to time in something of a poetic or allegorical sense, especially (exclusively?) when advocating some sort of action:
What God wants is a substitute for what I and my comrades want. “God wants us to feed the hungry,” often accompanied by a scriptural reference. (What’s unmentioned is whether “God wants us” to accomplish this as individuals, acting freely; or as a collective, acting by coercion. Guess what the leftie inevitably means in this context!)
It can easily get into liberation theology, in which “God wants” is a rhetorical substitute for a marxist or collectivist goal — which brings us back to the incumbent president, and brings me out of these comments.
Lefties only invoke The Maker when it suits their purposes. Lefties are liars. They lie to themselves (denial) and to everyone else. They do not answer questions; they wiggle and squirm, and often answer a question with another question.
Obama and his hangers-on in the Congress swear oaths because they must. They lie as they do it, and they lie about everything else, including the existence of a Supreme Being from whom rights flow.
Lefties are liars.
Hearing him speak those words was also interesting. He stuttered and hesitated for what seemed to be an eternity to say “the government is us”. Even for the cretinous ciphers who constitute “us, it’s a little unsettling to hear your president struggle so hard to express a fundamental and obvious concept about our government.
One gets the distinct impression that if he were born in another country… check that.. raised, check that too… ok if he was LIVING in another country, he would be quite happy to be the government of Obama, by Obama, and for Obama.
He omits creator because his base understands that he is the creator of the wishes and desires. By “the government is us” he means the elite political class and their high roller bank/corporate enablers. What a waste of oxygen.
There is nothing “Ebonic” about ‘natch’. It was sort of hip in WWII era movies.
He lies and rules by exception. Our rights mean nothing to him unless he is favorably served by them. He is a master of sinning by omission: shuck and jive of the masterful community organizer-taquiyya of the jihadist Muslim.
I was going to write more, a lot more, but why bother? It all boils down to Marxist socialism. That’s Obama’s vision. And, yes, it trumps the Constitution.
“Were Obama honest”
Good one!
Hate to be a nitpicker, but really, Neo! If you’re going to proclaim a word all-important
you need to get the word right:
unalienable.
nolanimrod:
Actually, my use of the “in” preface rather than the “un” preface is the form of the word that Obama has repeatedly used (“inalienable” rather than “unalienable”). If you follow my link in the PJ article (on the words “repeated tendency”) it leads to an article that discusses Obama’s repeated use of the word (he did not use it in his Denver speech, but he’s quoted it quite a few other times, minus the “Creator” part). You’ll see that he usually has quoted the word as “inalienable” rather than “unalienable.” I agree that in the article it looks like I’m referring to the Declaration of Independence’s use of the word, and I was. But I should have made it clearer that I was using the form Obama uses rather than the form the Declaration uses. The words have the exact same definition and mean the exact same thing, if you look them up, but “in” is indeed a slightly different form of the word.
Related (isn’t everything?):
This is a crucially important CSPAN special about the great dangers of our current economic mess:
http://www.c-spanvideo.org/program/311904-1
Pay particular attention to (the passionately angry) David Stockman, former WH Budget Director under Reagan, and author of THE GREAT DEFORMATION: The Corruption of Capitalism in America.
He makes a blisteringly clear analysis of the whole TARP debacle (etc.), and he and David Walker (former US Comptroller General) are furious with both parties and the widespread economic illiteracy and galloping greed in the plutocracy.
David Walker, former US Comptroller General, joins him. Both are IRATE.
The talk was to the economic reporters of various news outlets: whose questions at the end are revealing.
Well worth watching the whole thing: I couldn’t turn it off.
Oh, and: Obama delenda est.
I posted this on PJ. Cross-posting, because I think it bears considering:
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Where do Natural Rights “come from”? Not necessarily God, though one could argue for that — no, they are inherent in the design of the Universe and in the design of Life itself. If you accept the notion that God created the universe and life, then they derive from God, but disbelief in that possible precursor does not negate the antecedent.
Go look up the “Iterated Prisoner’s Dilemma”. There ARE inherent rules in the system, and Game Theory is one of the ways to identify them which is not dependent on any Faith or Creed.
Natural Rights are those inherent rules.
Obama’s beliefs are no more different or extreme than most of the Left and almost all Democrat members.
Why is this something new or surprising?