If You Can't Follow the Constitution then Resign!

 Dr. Richard Curtis, a professional philosopher and candidate for the U.S. Senate (I-WA) issued the following statement and analysis, Thursday, May 6, 2010:

When those who have sworn an oath of allegiance to the Constitution of the United States publicly call for the violation of the Constitution they should either resign or be expelled from office. There is no excuse for disrespecting the Constitution, especially by those entrusted, and sworn to protect it. If certain Senators actually introduce legislation allowing U.S. citizens to be stripped of their rights without trial these people should be forced to resign or expelled. It is despicable that defenders of the Constitution would so freely disregard everything it says and stands for.

For example: Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT) recently said: “I’m now putting together legislation to amend that to [specify that] any individual American citizen who is found to be involved in a foreign terrorist organization, as defined by the Department of State, would be deprived of their citizenship rights.”

What I would like to know is what in the world is this man thinking? He wants to just declare citizens non-citizens and ship them off to Guantanamo? Does he have any idea how the world works? It is as if he just doesn’t bother trying to make any sense and just spots off nonsense. Lieberman is an embarrassment to the U.S. Senate and the independent political movement that seems to put us together.

Granted the Senator has a way of using English that makes proper sentences and he can even seem like a sane person until you look at his ideas. The problem with the above quote is in the word, “found.” You see Sen. Lieberman has no idea what that means, who should determine it or what standards should apply. One might think this is a straight-forward problem but the Senator seems to not believe in such things as human rights. So when he talks about “a citizen who is found to be involved” he does not intend to say, “when a legitimate legal process finds” someone guilty, rather it seems that he means “when he or someone he likes thinks someone is guilty.” And all of that does not even begin to get to the problem of how the State Department comes up with that list of terrorist organizations (it includes medical charities, people who donate bicycles around the world, and all manner of groups that have nothing to do with violence). It is a list with no moral content and to suggest that one use it as a basis for denying people’s rights is not just immoral but actually evil.

Another example: Sen. Lindsay Graham (R-S.C.) said, “Even if you’re an American citizen helping the enemy, you should be viewed as a military threat…” And Sen. McCain said reading a citizen his rights was a “serious mistake.”

Really, you all don’t believe in the Constitution, you don’t believe in the principles that are supposed to guide our justice system? You don’t believe that people are innocent until proven guilty? It seems important to note here that the accused they have in mind (Faisal Shahzad) was not informed of his rights at the appropriate time (although he was later). Perhaps this is just an attempt to circumvent U.S. law, by declaring after the fact that such illegal behavior by law enforcement is acceptable (in circumstances that are never defined, but somehow always involve people of color accused of crimes in curious circumstances). No need for the truth or Constitutional procedure here any longer, in the country these people would have us live in. When Glenn Beck laments the lost America of his youth perhaps he means Miranda rights – that would at least make sense.

Evidently if someone shows up at Sen. Graham’s or Sen. McCain’s office and accuses them of being a terrorist, they believe they should be taken off and tortured until such time as they can prove their innocence (never mind that that is a logical impossibility). Since they obviously think such rules should apply to brown and black skinned people they ought to believe totalitarian laws should apply to them as well. Though, somehow I expect the these people’s thinking does not involve anything so pedestrian as logical consistency.

It is like Republicans along with Lieberman take turns spitting on the Constitution. These people seem not to have heard of the Bill of Rights, or just ignore it – in violation of their oath of office, I might point out – and that is why they should be expelled. It is not just that Lieberman and the rest suggest moronic and totalitarian laws, people can say what they want, it is that they do this as part of our legislative process even though such laws are clearly unconstitutional. They are insulting all of us.

These people also seem to have no understanding of legal philosophy or any sense of what purpose laws have. They are completely confused about the difference between military problems and police problems and yet they keep getting elected. It is as if reason is the real enemy these people have; and no matter how absurd and vile the idea they will support it.

I am in a race to join the Senate and it deeply disturbs me that so many of them have absolutely no respect for the Constitution, for human beings, or for human rights. These are the most powerful people in the world and they don’t even expect morality or rationality from their own members. It is disgraceful that Lieberman, Graham and McCain are not laughed out of the building for suggesting such ridiculous things. If people’s lives were not being destroyed by these wastes of carbon the whole thing would be funny. As it is they are a national disgrace.

You could throw darts at random phrases on a wall and come up with better legislation than these people. I realize the Republicans are ideologically committed to the insane idea that less government (except the military) is always better. Do they have to prove their devotion to that bit of seasoned irrationality by killing and ruining so many people’s lives?

Now, to be clear, there is no mystery why someone who has no understanding of the proper functions of government, the U.S. Constitution, history or anything for that matter can and, very often, is elected to high office. Both political parties make use of the political philosophy of Leo Strauss, which is itself just a mild version of the fascist philosophy of Carl Schmitt. This is celebrated by Neo-Conservative Intellectuals, but the foundations of Strauss’s political philosophy guide both Neo-Conservatives and the Democratic Leadership Council. These principles include primarily the belief that some are fit to rule and others follow, that leaders should lie to the public, and most vitally that wars are needed to keep citizen occupied. The Senators quoted above and at least a hundred other figures could be quoted to make the point that these people are not fit to lead. Ironically they are chosen for precisely that reason. Strauss said that those who really understand the world in his way (the Wise) should whisper in the ears of politicians (the Gentlemen) and they would tell the public the lies that must be told to keep society the way it is. That is why we are still at war even though a popular president promised to end at least one of them, that is why we are a torture state even though a popular president promised to end those crimes.

What is mysterious is why the American people have tolerated this for so long.