Category: History

SUICIDE OF THE WEST

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This past September marked the twentieth anniversary of what has come to be known as “9/11”, the day a band of terrorists, ensorcelled by a death cult masquerading as a religion, murdered nearly 3,000 people on United States soil.

For anyone at least thirty years old today, it was the kind of event so significant that everyone knows exactly where they were when it happened. For my fellow Generation Xers, it was our Pearl Harbor, our JFK assassination. Roused from our “holiday from history”, as George Will dubbed the decade between the end of the Cold War and 2001, we briefly rejoined the fight against tyranny and oppression.

Now, sadly, we have chosen again to turn our backs on that fight. The United States’ humiliating withdrawal from Afghanistan on August 15th of this year was not only shockingly inept in its execution, but also betrays this larger truth: The lack of resolve on display in our decision to withdraw portends a slow but steady march towards civilizational suicide.

The argument that the United States needed to end this “forever” war was superficially appealing but ultimately hollow. The fact is the battle against the forces of tyranny and oppression is now, always has been, and forever will be a battle Western civilization, and the United States in particular, cannot ever withdraw from.

The civilization we have been blessed to inherit will not self perpetuate. We must do the hard work of constantly maintaining it. “Things fall apart”, as the poet William Butler Yeats put it, and we must be resigned to the fact that the forces of nihilism and despair are ever present, waiting to tear down the civilization so many have sacrificed so much to build. Therefore, we must be prepared to combat those forces always. As much as we might have hoped it were the case, there is no “holiday from history” in this struggle.

Now, this is not to endorse any notion of “nation building”. That project, I believe, is similarly misguided, only instead of being borne of despair, like the sin of suicide, it is borne of hubris. I fear, however, that we have been lulled into the false belief that all efforts to protect and defend free society from tyranny are merely acts of Western imperialism. We are constantly told that our deep seated patriotism is a mere veneer for jingoism and nationalism, instead of the necessary lifeblood that feeds our will to survive as a country and civilization.

CONFLATING PATRIOTISM WITH NATIONALISM

The attacks of September 11, 2001 were so horrific that they stirred the patriotism of the American people to a degree not seen since probably World War Two. Nearly all were united in the determination to defend our country and our way of life against the nihilists who had attacked it that Tuesday morning. Alas, it did not take long for our resolve to weaken. Displays of patriotism make certain types of Americans quite uneasy. They view it as the jumping off point to what they fear are the deep seated jingoistic and nationalist predilections of the great unwashed masses. These more progressive minded, intellectually superior types feel it is their duty to save the world from the wicked American imperialist they heard so much about in college and graduate school.

While it is true that the average American retains a deep well of patriotism, I do not believe we have ever truly been, in our nature or temperament, nationalist. The patriot is one who loves his country as a parent does his child, willing to sacrifice his own well being for his country’s sake. This is a crucially different mindset than that of the nationalist. The nationalist loves his country in much shallower manner. Our friend G.K. Chesterton may shed some light here. Chastising his fellow Englishmen for their misappropriation of patriotism in support of a clearly imperialist venture in South Africa in the early 20th century, he said:

“On all sides we hear to-day of the love of our country, and yet anyone who has literally such a love must be bewildered at the talk, like a man hearing all men say that the moon shines by day and the sun by night. The conviction must come to him at last that these men do not realize what the word ‘love’ means, that they mean by the love of country, not what a mystic might mean by the love of God, but something of what a child might mean by the love of jam….’My country, right or wrong,’ is a thing that no patriot would think of saying except in a desperate case. It is like saying, ‘My mother, drunk or sober’. No doubt if a decent man’s mother took to drink he would share her troubles to the last; but to talk as if he would be in a state of gay indifference as to whether his mother took to drink or not is certainly not the language of men who know the great mystery (of patriotism).”

G.K Chesterton

OUR DANGEROUS NAIVETE

The West’s victory, (mostly our victory, truth be told), in the near fifty year Cold War, the struggle with Communism and its primary proponent and exporter, the Soviet Union, had some observers prophesying a permanent triumph for liberal, democratic values. In fact, in 1992, in the recent wake of the fall of Soviet communism, political scientist Francis Fukuyama published his famous book, The End of History and the Last Man , in which he argued the end of the Cold War and the dissolution of the Soviet empire marked “not just … the passing of a particular period of post-war history, but the end of history as such: That is, the end-point of mankind’s ideological evolution and the universalization of Western liberal democracy as the final form of human government.” Fukuyama’s book ignited a vigorous academic debate. Some agreed that, to paraphrase Dr. Martin Luther King, the arc of political history bends toward democracy. Others were not so sure.

Many in academia and the chattering classes mistook that temporary victory as a permanent one, and they dreamed of a world where we no longer had to remain vigilant in our defense of Western Civilization. In fact, they argued, we needed to dispense with our patriotism and Western chauvinism because they were now relics of a bygone era. Keeping them now would only reveal us to be racist, imperialistic thugs in the eyes of the world community. Although temporarily awakened from that delusional dream on 9/11, it was not long before the voices urging us to “get out of all these foreign wars” grew louder and more persistent.

Now, the ineptitude displayed by the Biden administration during the withdrawal from Afghanistan was truly embarrassing. Of course, what could we really expect from an administration headed by a political mediocrity whose intellectual capacity is as thin as his hairline. What is more distressing, ultimately, are the false presumptions that underlay the decision to withdraw in the first place. We cannot blame Biden for that. His supposed foreign policy expertise has always been a myth. As one of former President Obama’s Secretaries of Defense, Robert Gates, famously remarked, “Joe Biden has been wrong on nearly every major foreign policy and national security issue over the past four decades.” Biden is like the typical college sophomore, the “wise fool”, spouting platitudinous phrases that sound deep and insightful in the wee hours of a late night, dorm room bull session but that fall apart when subjected to the clear realities of daylight. The sad truth, however, is Biden’s sophomoric pronouncements merely reflect the inch deep pool of conventional wisdom in which he wallows.

Apparently the Biden administration was taken by surprise at the American public’s decidedly negative reaction to the withdrawal. It’s no wonder. He, like the rest of the so-called foreign policy establishment, have always misread the American public’s view. I submit that the American people have always had the intuitive good sense to distinguish between the love of country that informs patriotism versus the shallow jingoism of nationalism. It is the intellectuals who, purposely, I believe, have tried to tar the American people as closet imperialists. In fact, the American people have always been wary of “foreign wars”. They come by that naturally, as they took careful heed of their father’s warning to avoid foreign entanglements. What they have never lacked, until recently that is, is the resolve to fight the enemies of freedom, whenever and wherever they may arise.

REDISCOVERING OUR RESOLVE

Taking advantage of the strategic mistakes we made in Iraq and Afghanistan, foreign policy “experts” like Biden have managed to convince us that our retreat from Afghanistan is not a mistake but instead the proper rejection of a misguided nationalism. What the cynicism and intellectual snobbery of our so-called elites has actually achieved is to put the country, once aptly described as the “last best hope of earth“, on an inexorable path to self immolation.

Fortitude is defined as “love readily bearing all things for the sake of the loved object.” Any parents reading this will immediately understand the meaning of those words. While we may still demonstrate fortitude individually, as a society we tire easily and get bored quickly. There are many unpleasant but necessary tasks that happen to be essential to civilizational survival. Only citizens who love their country like a mother does her child will be willing to endure the necessary unpleasantness that is required to ensure its survival. Is it any wonder that our modern society, wherein patriotism has become passe, finds itself unable to muster the fortitude to endure for the sake of it’s own survival?

Remarking on his choice of title to his 2018 best seller about the threats facing our civilization, author Jonah Goldberg noted that he settled on “Suicide of the West” because it accurately conveyed his belief that the decline and ultimate death of Western civilization can only occur by choice. The suicidal person no longer believes life is worth living and has thus lost the will, the fortitude, to endure the vicissitudes of life and stay in the fight. A civilization that lacks belief in its own worth will eventually lack the fortitude to fight for its survival. With its withdrawal from Afghanistan, the United States simply acknowledged the sad fact that we lack the fortitude necessary to “bear all things” for the sake of our own survival.

In the Catholic tradition, suicide is considered a grave sin, and rightly so. “The suicide”, as Chesterton wisely observed, “is the ultimate and absolute evil, the refusal to take an interest in existence; the refusal to take the oath of loyalty to life. The man who kills a man, kills a man. The man who kills himself, kills all men; as far as he is concerned he wipes out the world.”

We owe it to the brave men and women who have given “the last full measure of devotion” to our nation to rediscover our fortitude. For the sake of future generations, we must not commit the grave sin of civilizational suicide. We must not allow cynicism and despair to poison our healthy patriotism and thereby weaken our resolve to stay in the fight. As the poet and philosopher T.S Eliot reminds us:

“If we take the widest and wisest view of a Cause, there is no such thing as a Lost Cause because there is no such thing as a Gained Cause. We fight for lost causes because we know that our defeat and dismay may be the preface to our successors’ victory, though that victory itself will be temporary; we fight rather to keep something alive than in the expectation that anything will triumph.”

T. S. Eliot

IT’S A MAD, MAD, MAD, MAD WORLD

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I cannot recount to you how many times over the past year or so I have thought to myself, “That’s just crazy.” Ever since the tragic death of George Floyd, it seems we have been inundated with a tsunami of stories purporting to expose the structural racism and white privilege endemic to the United States. The accusations stretch far and wide. They of course rain down almost daily upon your average white male heterosexual, a.k.a guilty, citizen. But these torrents are powerful enough to have burst through the heretofore unassailable defenses of even people such as Tom Hanks, the widely respected actor whose universal popularity and conventional liberal politics everyone assumed would have sheltered him from this storm. However, as even Mr. Hanks found out, this madness is widespread, and we are all drowning in it. As the great Brook Benton sang, “Feels like it’s raining all over the world.”

There was one story I read that particularly stood out, however. The facts of the incident are not especially notable as these things go today. It was the following sentence, however, that struck me like a thunderbolt from the heavens:

The story highlights the tensions between a student’s deeply felt sense of personal truth and facts that are at odds with it.

Michael Powell, New York Times, February 24, 2021

I began to wonder. Who is the most convinced of the absolute truth of their vision of the world, no matter the facts that are odds with it? Is it the preacher, the politician, the common man? No, it is none of them. It is the madman. The doubts of even a Mother Teresa have been well documented, but the certainty of Jim Jones was deadly. FDR tried one thing, and if didn’t work he’d try another. Hitler could not be swayed from his deeply felt sense of personal truth, to the tune of millions of deaths. The average man might jokingly speculate that he would do a better job than those in charge and therefore dream about being a king for a day. The lunatic has allowed his speculations, devoid of a sense of humor and a proper humility, to harden into the unassailable certainty that he really is the King of England in disguise.

THE CLEAN, WELL LIT PRISON OF ONE IDEA

In his masterwork, Orthodoxy, Chesterton entitles his second chapter “The Maniac”. In it he describes the commonalities materialist philosophers and academics in his time shared with the inhabitants of Hanwell, a London mental hospital. Rereading this chapter recently I finally understood why the word ‘crazy ‘ kept jumping into my head every time I heard one of those racism stories. It was because the stories were so marinated in the insanity known as Critical Race Theory (CRT). CRT is an academic theory, and its proponents and adherents are for the most part academics, which is to say rationalists. As an explanation for the world, CRT suffers from the same shortcoming as the materialists’ worldview did over a century ago: Their reasoning leads to madness.

I may shock the reader by admitting there is truth in some of what CRT argues. There is truth in it, in the same way it is true that the Earth and a golf ball are both spheres. But what a great amount of truth there is left out! Just like the lunatic, who papers his wall with photos and news clippings, all connected by push pins and string, CRT purports to explain a large many things. But whatever truths it might touch upon, it doesn’t explain them in a large way. Their logic may be as complete and symmetrical as a circle, but it is not a very large circle. It has only room enough for one idea, repeated over and over. One might ask of the CRT enthusiast, are there no other stories in the world except yours? Is there no other drama happening but the one starring you?

Quite simply, as Chesterton famously described it, the maniac is trapped “in the clean, well lit prison of one idea.” And unfortunately for us, that one idea…that one mad, mad idea…has leaked out of the asylum and, much like the Corona virus, infected the world. The young woman in the story linked to above is only capable of seeing the world through one lens. She, and the other adherents of CRT, have taken one idea and crammed the entire world into it. It is the mark of true madness: a logical completeness married to a spiritual contraction. Cynical nihilism coupled with boundless self regard. As Chesterton notes, how much larger your world would be if your self could become smaller in it.

The madman is not the man who has lost his reason. The madman is the man who has lost everything except his reason.

G.K. Chesterton

If we choose to continue to instantiate the limited vision of world defined by CRT, we will be choosing the path to madness. CRT, being a product of the academy, necessarily suffers from its flaws: the fatal combination of an expansive and exhaustive reason coupled with an almost complete absence of common sense. CRT is like the person who only can see the zebra as having a white coat with black stripes and is wholly incapable of summoning the imagination to see the zebra as black coated with white stripes.

THE NIGHTMARE…OR THE DREAM?

Did you ever notice that whenever someone describes a “nightmare”, their description invariably involves some variation of the same theme: endlessly falling into a dark oblivion, or repeatedly being chased by some monster, human or otherwise, or being compelled to face some other deep seated fear. In their vision they nearly always describe the experience as one of being stuck in some perverse twilight zone of fear and anxiety, where they are doomed to endlessly relive their terror, as if on a merry-go-round from Hell. It is interesting to note that insanity has been described, as much as it can be, in very similar terms. The lunatic is simply one who is experiencing the type of nightmare from which one never wakes up.

When, however, one recounts what they describe as a “dream”, the story is quite different. It often involves magical creatures who lead one on exciting if somewhat unintelligible adventures. Or often the drama is populated by old friends, or lost loved ones, and one has the chance to reenact happy moments and to make new ones. The entire tone and tenor of the experience speaks to a kind of mystical sanity, precisely opposite of the nightmare. The person recalling their dream has an expression of wonder and excitement at the possibility of it all, and they are anxious to have that dream again. Has anyone ever said that about a nightmare?

Not long ago…although in today’s climate it feels like a lifetime…when talking about the issue of race in this country, instead of the nightmare of CRT, we talked about our dreams. There was one man, a black man, who articulated that dream, that vision of who we could be, one hot summer day.

Of course he was a Christian preacher, a man who follows the Son. The Christian places the Son at the center of his universe and reasons out from there. His faith provides him with the mystical imagination, as Chesterton put it, to accept the mystery of Christ at the center of things so that all else in the world becomes intelligible.

In our universe the sun blazes on in the heavens, often somewhat hazy and mysterious, but it alone provides both light and heat. Its counterpart, on the other hand, is the cold, lifeless moon, floating in the darkness of dead space: light without heat, and only reflected light at that. CRT is a product of the academy, home to the rationalists and their cold, lifeless theories. It’s no coincidence the moon’s Latin name forms the root of the word lunatic.

THE DOWNLOAD

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FEBRUARY 2021

SHE BLINDED ME WITH SCIENCE

For those of you that did not come of age during the early years of MTV, when they just played music videos, the headline to this paragraph is of course the title to the Thomas Dolby song…more famous for the bizarre video than the actual song. In fact, I do not remember ever hearing the song on the radio…only “seeing” the song, if you will, on MTV. I suspect there were many songs like that during that era. They were composed merely as vehicles for the frustrated cinematic aspirations of the songwriter. Dolby admitted as much in 2011 when he was interviewed about the song’s origins.

I mention it here not only because so many of those early MTV videos still cling to my grey matter like lichen to a stone (such is the brain of a teenager), but also because I’ve noticed a curious trend regarding the role of science in our politics.

The Conservative sensibility tends by nature toward “adherence to the old and tried as opposed to the new and untried”, as Lincoln formulated it. This makes it naturally more circumspect when it comes to embracing the latest “thing”, scientific or otherwise. Chesterton, unsurprisingly, wonderfully articulates the virtues of conservatism with his famous thought experiment about “the fence”:

There exists in such a case a certain institution or law; let us say, for the sake of simplicity, a fence or gate erected across a road. The more modern type of reformer goes gaily up to it and says, “I don’t see the use of this; let us clear it away.” To which the more intelligent type of reformer will do well to answer: “If you don’t see the use of it, I certainly won’t let you clear it away. Go away and think. Then, when you can come back and tell me that you do see the use of it, I may allow you to destroy it.”

GK Chesterton

Of course, human nature being what it is, thoughtful resistance to radical change can morph, whether thru fear or selfishness, or both, into the reactionary posture most famously represented by the Luddites.

Conservatism’s opponents long ago seized on the Luddite caricature to tar all of conservatism as anti-science and anti-progress. Countless disingenuous portrayals of the conservative as an unapologetic Luddite saturate our media and popular culture. These portrayals, usually beginning with Galileo and his spat with Pope Urban VIII, have been largely successful in cementing the public perception that progressives desires are motivated solely by the cold, hard facts of science, while conservatives “cling to their guns and religion”, as a prominent progressive once famously proclaimed.

Of course the conceit that Progressives are simply “following the SCIENCE” when crafting their political positions was always just that–a conceit. Their fidelity to “SCIENCE” (as they always seem to prefer to type it) is tenuous at best.

Take, as just one example, Progressives’ full fledged endorsement of the radical transgender agenda. It doesn’t get more scientifically basic than the biological fact that XX is not XY. Yet, we are told to ignore this fact in service to the ludicrous concept that it is a fundamental civil right to not only decide for yourself you no longer wish to be the sex you were biologically assigned, but also to force the society in which you are blessed to live to acknowledge your new identity as a civil right. Just ask those girls, who are being forced by the Biden Administration to compete with…and lose to…biological males in high school athletics, what they think of Progressives’ commitment to science.

Or, what about the issue of abortion? In an ironic twist, the ongoing advances in science and technology have served to undercut the political position of most progressives. Abortion supporters long standing claim that the choice a woman makes when she has an abortion does not involve the killing of a human being is becoming nearly impossible to honestly defend.

Any parents of school aged children out there? At this point in the COVID-19 pandemic, when numerous private schools have figured out a way to get kids back into classrooms successfully, where is the science behind the refusal of so many public schools to reopen? Progressives craven political calculus-that fealty to the teachers unions is their most pressing concern-is the only whiff of science you’ll find there.

Funny thing, science. It doesn’t care about your feelings, or how you wish reality to be, or even which political constituency you find yourself needing to placate. Facts are stubborn things, as the saying goes. The Luddites found that out. Now, despite their snarky putdowns and sanctimonious preening, Progressives are having to face the facts as well, and it isn’t pretty. There is no bigger tell of the cognitive dissonance they are experiencing than their annoying habit of putting the word “science” in all capital letters whenever they type it. That’s the written equivalent of someone yelling at the top of their lungs in an argument. Dr. Freud might call that overcompensation. When the facts are not on your side in a debate, you have two choices: Concede the argument, or yell louder. Who is clinging desperately to the past now, Mr. Obama?

ON LENT

The Lenten season has begun. Six weeks of trying to refocus our priorities to what’s important. Interestingly, speaking of science, research has shown that in order to make any lasting habitual changes, we humans need 66 days on average to imprint the new behaviors. A Lenten commitment to change our ways puts us well onto that path to success. Maybe the Church was not so anti-science after all?

The fact is the Church has never been anti-science. That is a myth. Many of the great discoveries of science were made by “church men”. Science and religion are not antithetical. They simply are exploring different questions. What really troubles those steeped in post modern, purely “scientific” modes of thought is the Church’s small “c” catholicism. By that I mean, her comfort in embracing all modes of thought and being, material and non-material, and her ability to embrace paradox and revel in the mysterious.

As Chesterton observed…there’s that guy again! Do yourself a favor this Lent and discover Gilbert Keith Chesterton. Start with his own story of conversion, Orthodoxy. It is a short book, which is good, because you will want to read it several times…anyway, as Chesterton observed, modern rationalism seeks to explain everything with reason. It wants to do away with the jagged edges of humanity and existence, smoothing everything out into a perfect sphere of logic and rationality. That is why the perfect symbol for modern thought is the circle. Of course, Chesterton notes, the circle also represents madness. Modern rationalism just goes around in circles, like the ancient symbol of the serpent eating its own tail.

A madman is not the man who has lost his reason. The madman is the man who has lost everything except his reason.

GK Chesterton

The symbol of Christianity is, of course, the cross–the ultimate paradox. The cross is the physical representation of paradox, the holding of two opposing ideas at once: the horizontal and the vertical. Christ on the cross is the spiritual representation of paradox and the essence of the faith. One will never be able to embrace that faith until one is able to accept the ultimate mystery of the crucifixion and resurrection.

WHERE I STAND:

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THE CASE FOR THE IMPEACHMENT AND CONVICTION OF DONALD J. TRUMP

(Reader’s note: This essay is the first in what is intended to be a series of essays laying out my position on what seem to me to be important issues, whether the nature of those issues be political, philosophical, moral, or some combination of each of those things. The issues may address topics timely–as is the case here–or timeless. They are simply one person’s opinion, but my hope in presenting them is to induce the reader to at least reflect on the issue anew while exposing them to a viewpoint they may not have previously considered.)

ARGUING IN GOOD FAITH

Originally, I considered titling this essay “The Constitutional Case for the Impeachment and Conviction of Donald J. Trump”. However, I realized to imply that faithfulness to the Constitution demands one agree with the proposition Donald Trump should be impeached and/or convicted would be to fall into the trap I rail against constantly. We need to temper the natural tendency to cast out opposing views as necessarily springing from pernicious motives. I have read several excellent arguments both for and against the impeachment of our 45th President. The arguments on both sides are made by partisan political actors. After all, we are all partisan. But to acknowledge that fact is not to concede that a legitimate Constitutional case cannot be made for or against impeachment and conviction in this case.

I hope it has been made clear to regular readers of this blog that I am an originalist when it comes to The Constitution. If originalism means anything, it means that the Constitution is not partisan. It does not prescribe a conservative or progressive policy answer. Originalists do not start with a preferred political or policy outcome and then go find the the justification for it in the text. Originalism as a philosophy says our job is to read and interpret the Constitution in the plain meaning of the text. Where there is not plain meaning, we are to use our intellect, available scholarship, and ultimately our informed judgement to discern the original intent of the Founders, wherever that leads. That is my goal here. You must decide whether I fail or succeed. But let’s try to get out of the habit of ascribing bad faith to every argument with which we disagree.

WHAT IS IMPEACHMENT?

The Constitution grants Congress alone the power to impeach. This fact is instructive in and of itself. Despite our more recent tendencies, Congress was always envisioned by the Founders as being the supreme branch of our government. Article I states that the House of Representatives shall have the sole power to impeach and that the Senate shall have the the sole power to try all impeachments. No person shall be convicted without the concurrence of two thirds of the members present. Article II, which generally describes the role of the Executive Branch, specifies that ‘the President, Vice President, and all civil officers of the United States shall be removed from office upon impeachment and conviction of treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors’.

The Founders were rightly concerned about abuses of power by the Executive and Judicial branches. The topic of impeachment was discussed often in the deliberations surrounding the adoption of the Constitution. Impeachment is a concept borrowed from English law and was intended as a means by which civil officers who commit criminal acts, engage in conduct clearly unbecoming of their office, or generally abuse their powers can be held accountable by Congress. The clear intent was to provide the people with some means of relief from an official engaged in treachery, corruption, or behavior inconsistent with the faithful execution of their duties or damaging to the institution as a whole. Some members of the convention worried impeachment could be used in purely political manner by Congress, whereby they would simply impeach an official with whom they disagreed politically. The Founders understood impeachment was ultimately a political consideration, not a narrow criminal or civil procedure. That is why they made impeachment moderately difficult and conviction quite difficult. The Founders expected impeachment to be employed more often, as a corrective to executive and judicial officers whose actions endangered the proper functioning of government or threatened its institutional integrity. The reality is Congress has been quite reluctant to employ its impeachment power. There must be quite broad agreement in the House in order to draft and pass articles of impeachment. Even then, the two thirds consent required in the Senate for conviction raises a daunting factor of even broader public sentiment required for success. Politicians, particularly in the House, are naturally wary of being too far out in front of their constituents. The raw political calculus involved works to ensure, as history has proven, the judicious employment of the impeachment power.

WHAT CONSTITUTES HIGH CRIMES AND MISDEMEANORS?

Most of the controversy over impeachment has centered on the clause in Article II, ‘high crimes and misdemeanors’. In arguing in favor of an impeachment provision being included in the Constitution, Alexander Hamilton noted that several state constitutions included the provision of impeachment for ‘maladministration’. Madison, fearing the term may be politically abused, substituted in his final draft of the Constitution another term, borrowed again from the English: ‘high crimes and misdemeanors’. Debate has raged ever since over precisely what this phrase means in the context of impeachment. First, realize that ‘high crimes’ in 18th century parlance means ‘activity by or against those who have special duties acquired by taking an oath of office’. For those of you with a military background, think of it as similar to the oft heard charges in military tribunals of ‘dereliction of duty’ and ‘conduct unbecoming’. I think a clear, concise, accurate, and helpful understanding of the overall meaning and intent of the phrase was summed up in an article in Smithsonian Magazine. The author, Erick Trickey, writes that the Founders, after vigorous debate, ultimately concurred that civil officers, and particularly the President, would be subject to impeachment “for abuses of power that subvert the Constitution, the integrity of government, or the rule of law.”

Some have tried to argue, as recently as during the debates over Trump’s most recent impeachment, that only indictable criminal offenses qualify as impeachable, since any other interpretation would lead to the politicization of the impeachment power. While many brilliant legal minds have argued this way, I believe their interpretation is simply wrong in this case. The records of the debates during the Constitutional convention clearly indicate that the high crimes and misdemeanors phrase was meant to broaden the scope of Congress’ impeachment power beyond the narrower limits of crimes indictable in a criminal court. After listing the crimes of treason and bribery, many of the delegates worried that there needed to be wording that allowed Congress to employ its impeachment power to cover actions that may not be criminal but that were clearly deleterious to the Constitutional order. As noted, mindful of the potential for political abuse, they rejected Hamilton’s suggested term (‘maladministration’) and settled on the now famous, and, I contend, still misunderstood, ‘high crimes and misdemeanors’.

AND NOW FOR THE ISSUE AT HAND…

I believe, without any doubt or hesitation, that in the time between approximately November 4, 2020 and January 6, 2021, Donald J. Trump engaged in actions that qualify as impeachable offenses and therefore should be impeached in the House for those actions.

That being said, the charges drawn up by the House committee and adopted by the House were ill considered and foolish. As former federal prosecutor Andy McCarthy argues in National Review, the charge of incitement to insurrection is “needlessly problematic and provocative”. It allows Trump and his defenders to focus on the legal definition of those words while sidestepping Trump’s undermining of the Constitution and his dereliction of duty.

In the narrow legal sense, Trump could not be convicted in a criminal court of incitement. That requires ‘an unambiguous call for violence’ that creates ‘an imminent threat of violence’. Also, despite the fact that what happened at the Capitol on January 6th was clearly an insurrection, including that charge in the impeachment is particularly galling to many Americans who witnessed countless acts of insurrectionist violence over the past year but were told by many in Congress and the media that those protests were largely peaceful and righteous.

However, even with those reservations in mind, I would still vote to impeach. The articles of impeachment as drawn up are flawed, unnecessarily focused on specific criminal charges, but they still detail an overall pattern of encouraging anti-constitutional actions and a singular, but unforgivable, failure to carry out the duties of the office, both of which are impeachable offenses.

TRUMP’S OFFENSES

As McCarthy notes, Trump should have been charged with Dereliction of Duty and Subversion of the Constitution’s Election Process. Trump’s plain and stunning failure to take any action to defend the Congress, and his own Vice President, who, due to Trump’s own actions (see below) was clearly one of the primary targets of the rioters’ violence, is a clear dereliction of his duty. He blatantly ignored plea’s for action and simply watched passively as the events unfolded before him on the television.

As for the charge of Subversion, it is necessary to provide some context as to Trump’s actions since the election in November. He has consistently peddled numerous conspiracy theories to his followers, contending that he was the true winner of the election and that they must take action to #stopthesteal. All of these accusations have been proven false or brought into serious doubt, as even Trump’s own Attorney General at the time, Bill Barr, told him in no uncertain words. Yet he has continued to recklessly promote them as fact to his followers. In the days leading up to the rally at the Capitol, he consistently pressured his Vice President and members of Congress to violate their 12th amendment duties to certify the election. He and his supporters touted the rally on the 6th as a way to further ramp up the pressure on Pence and the other lawmakers and framed it as their last chance to “stop the steal”.

TO CONVICT OR NOT TO CONVICT

The decision to convict the President lies with the Senate. Some have protested that the timing of the impeachment, so close to the end of Trump’s legal term of office, makes it impossible to conduct the necessary trial and therefore his impeachment is moot. I disagree. Even if the trial and conviction were to extend beyond Trump’s term of office, I think it should be conducted and he should be found guilty. Even with my reservations about the wording of the actual articles that were charged, I would still vote to convict.

To some, impeaching and convicting an official after he has left office makes no sense and would be counterproductive. However, I believe the intent of the impeachment power goes beyond the specifics of one set of circumstances. There is actually precedent in several state constitutions for impeachment of civil officers after their time in office. This tells me that impeachment was always understood as more than a process to identify or punish the particular unbecoming acts, criminal or otherwise, of particular officials. Impeachment, and ultimately conviction, involves the protection of the integrity of our institutions and the assurance of their continued survival and flourishing. It is intended to send a message to the accused, but also to the public, that behavior antithetical to the norms of good government and society as a whole cannot be tolerated, lest we risk the dissolution of our Republic.

Impeachment is a serious matter in which serious, thoughtful people can disagree. I believe in this case, Donald J. Trump was plainly derelict in his duties during the riot at the Capitol on January 6th, 2021, and wantonly and dangerously subversive of the Constitutional order since at least November 4th, 2020. He therefore is deserving of his impeachment in the House. After a trial in the Senate, he should be convicted and suffer the remaining penalties prescribed in the Constitution: disqualification from holding any public office in the future.

THE LESSER ANGELS OF OUR NATURE

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The ransacking of the United States Capitol on January 6th by pro-Trump rioters was a disgrace. Especially disturbing is the fact the rioters proclaim themselves “Patriots”. If they were “Patriots” the word has no meaning with which I am familiar. Attacking and vandalizing the most recognizable symbol of our system of government are the actions of idiotic morons, not patriotic citizens. They are no better, nor worse, than the violent mobs we witnessed this past summer burn communities and take over parts of cities.

The optimist in me tries to reassure my distressed spirit by telling me that in spite of this insanity, the center ultimately held. The bulwarks designed by the Framers were triggered and there were still enough people committed to defending the integrity of our institutions to prevent any permanent damage to their structure. The pessimist in me wonders: for how long?

“Character is destiny.”

HERACLITUS

The events of last week were in no small part the result of the defective character of our current President. For anyone willing to see it, this was how it was destined to end for Donald Trump’s administration. Yet his character flaws were not only overlooked by his supporters, in the eyes of his most dedicated fans (fan is short for fanatic I’ll remind you) they were actually celebrated. Petty, vindictive, boorish was transmuted in their minds into “HE FIGHTS FOR US!”.

The Founders were not naive. They understood the office of the Presidency was a political office and would not always be occupied by virtuous men such as George Washington. That is why they designed the government the way they did. As I have noted in previous posts, the Constitution contains many safeguards designed to prevent any one person or branch of government from being able to exercise complete power. Despite the drama of the past week, the system worked, effectively checking the self absorbed whims of the current occupant of the White House.

“Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”

John Adams

But what of our character…and ultimately, our destiny…as a nation? That a person of such spectacularly poor character as Donald Trump was, if not outright championed by so many, deemed at least the lesser of two evils in 2016, is a sad and troublesome commentary on our society at large. I am not the first to identify Trump as merely a symptom. Many have recognized this fact. The nature of the disease is harder to pinpoint.

THE SELFIE SOCIETY

We love to nickname our generations: The Greatest Generation, Baby Boomers, Gen-Xers, and Millennials. We also label certain historical eras in an attempt to convey the mood of the time: The Gilded Age, The Jazz Age, The Me Decade. I can think of no better moniker for our current moment than “The Selfie Society”. Its defining characteristic is an all encompassing self-absorption. Is there a more telling cultural artifact than “The Selfie”? Taken on our “I” phones (of course), it captures the outside world as meaningful only in relation to ourselves. Social Media platforms dovetail perfectly with this mindset, simultaneously reinforcing and expanding our subjective existence until there is barely an objective reality to speak of. The saying used to be you are entitled to your own opinions but not to your own facts. Now we are each entitled to our own facts. What is good is what I agree with. What is bad is what I disagree with. What is true is what I want to be true. Is it any wonder we struggle to find any “common ground” these days? Our governing system is designed for persuasion and compromise. The psychological mindset of the Selfie Society creates ever increasing alienation and division.

The Selfie Society is not only destroying our interpersonal relationships, it is infecting our institutions as well. We are all wheels and no cogs. The survival of our institutions depends upon individuals subverting their personal needs and goals for the betterment and ultimate flourishing of the institution. Where will we find the people willing to make this kind of sacrifice in the Selfie Society? Institutions and organizations are not to be served but to serve us…as platforms for our personal brand. We see it more and more in the sports world and the business world. The operative question has become, what’s in it for me? The idea of being a team player or a good company man is unimaginable in the Selfie Society. And now our institutions of public service have been infected by the same mindset. Increasingly we are seeing people get into public service because the “public” part of the phrase “public service” provides an excellent platform for their personal brand. The “service” part is conveniently forgotten.

Donald Trump is only the most prominent example. Oh, you say, politicians have always been egomaniacs craving attention! Of course they have. To a point. I submit to you that the Selfie Era politician is of a different breed–a breed whose continued propagation will deal a fatal blow to this republic. Think about this: Richard Nixon, whose personal ambition and thirst for political power were unsurpassed by any of his contemporaries, did two things in his career that would be inconceivable to Donald Trump. After the 1960 presidential election, in which Nixon ran against John F. Kennedy and lost by a razor thin margin, it was widely accepted among those in the political classes that widespread voter fraud in the Democrat controlled city of Chicago had tipped the balance in Kennedy’s favor. By all accounts, Nixon could have mounted a very strong (stronger by a magnitude of a thousand than the claims Trump has been touting) challenge to the final result. But he chose not to. There probably were many self serving reasons why Nixon chose to not challenge the result, but at least one of his reasons was that he felt it was better for the country to not put it through that drama. Fourteen years later, facing impeachment and certain conviction after the exposure of the Watergate break in and cover up…at his arguably personal and definitely his political nadir…he chose to resign rather than put the country through the turmoil of impeachment.

Fast forward to 2020 and the Selfie Society. After losing an election-mostly due to his own lack of discipline–Donald Trump refused to concede. Instead, he has continued to push the lie(over Twitter, of course–the perfect medium for the prototypical Selfie Society politician) that the election was stolen. He has repeatedly peddled bogus conspiracy theories and riled up his equally self deluded followers. He even threw his loyal Vice President under the bus by insanely insisting Mike Pence had the power to overturn the election results. After Trump egged on a riot at the Capitol on January 6th, he now also faces Impeachment and ever increasing chances of conviction. Yet, he argues that those pursuing the impeachment are provoking more riots and chaos and that he needs to continue to fight.

The saddest part is that his die hard supporters continue to believe he really fights for them. If he thought of anyone but himself, he would resign and spare the country the turmoil he claims to believe would result from his impeachment. The fact is he has never fought for anything outside of his own self interest. There is nothing bigger to Donald Trump than Donald Trump. Just ask Mike Pence. Trump is the Selfie President.

“At what point, then, is the approach of danger to be expected? I answer, if it ever reaches us, it must spring up among us. It cannot come from abroad. If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time or die by suicide.”

Abraham Lincoln

Lincoln understood what the Founders understood. The survival of this form of government and this nation depends upon us. Hopefully the tragic events of the last week will force us to lift up our eyes from our backlit screens, venture out of our Selfie induced nightmare, and rediscover the ‘better angels of our nature’.

My Conservative Sensibility: Part III

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American Conservatives seek to conserve the principles of the American Founding. In part I, we examined how natural rights theory, the philosophical concept that asserts men are born free and possess inherent, or “natural” rights, animated the core political philosophy of the Founders. Its logic led them to conclude the only just form of government is one derived from the consent of the governed. In part II, we examined how the Judeo-Christian conception of an unchanging and fallen human nature was also a key part of the Founders thinking. That worldview made the Founders particularly wary of man’s tyrannical tendencies when given power over others and therefore properly skeptical of mankind’s capacity to produce a perfect political system. A Judeo-Christian worldview, marinated in the intellectual and philosophical currents of natural rights theory, created the framework within which the Founders approached the task of designing their new government in the late 1780’s. The eventual design of our Constitution was primarily the result of the political genius of James Madison. His detailed study of past human efforts to organize mankind politically prompted the insights that helped him craft our unique Constitutional system, a system American Conservatives believe to be the ‘last, best hope of earth’.

“Democracy is the worst form of government…except for all the others.”

Winston Churchill

As Madison studied political arrangements throughout history, he attempted to dissect the flaws in each and every system. Madison reverted to first principles. He asked himself, like any true conservative, What is the worst outcome of any political system? His answer can be boiled down to one word: tyranny. Whether it be monarchy, oligarchy, or even the democracies of Ancient Greece, the risk of any political arrangement devolving into tyranny was a danger he was keenly aware of, particularly in light of the recent experiences with the British crown.

AUXILIARY PRECAUTIONS

Madison realized the inherent risk to the democratic system he was trying to craft was a tyranny of the majority. The danger to democratic systems posed by the mob, whose temporary passions lead to the imposition of ill-considered notions, is akin to a fever sweeping through one’s body. Madison sought to inoculate the American body politic against this potential catastrophic fever by fortifying his design with what he called “auxiliary precautions”. These measures are what you may have heard referred to in school as “checks and balances”. The genius of Madison was his insight that he could use men’s natural self interestedness as a check against their potential abuse of democratic power. These measures, such as separation of powers between, and even among, the branches of government; procedural checks on those powers enjoyed by each branch over the other; and the varying means and methods of electing the members of each branch, including the unfairly maligned electoral college, are, to the conservative sensibility, some of the ingenious features of our system.

CLOSED QUESTIONS IN AN OPEN SOCIETY

As the Constitutional convention of 1787 wore on, its members, who were generally in agreement with Madison’s basic framework for the new government, began to split into two camps regarding its final form. Federalists, led by Madison and Alexander Hamilton, were keen to ensure that the new system created a federal government much stronger than the weak and ineffectual central government under the Articles of Confederation. Their opponents, dubbed Anti-Federalists, were wary of too much centralized power, fearing it would infringe upon the freedoms of the states in the union, and ultimately, the individual rights of the people. They demanded that in return for their support of Madison’s overall plan, a list of enumerated, individual rights be written down as part of the text of the new constitution. Madison felt the Constitution’s basis in natural rights philosophy made it implicit that nothing in the document could be interpreted to override those natural rights belonging to the people. Additionally, he feared that by specifically listing some rights, other rights enjoyed by the people, could be interpreted by future generations to not be protected. In classic American political fashion, a compromise was reached. The Anti- Federalists agreed to vote for adoption of the new Constitution with the understanding that Madison and the Federalists would immediately implement, via the amendment process written into the Constitution, a list of enumerated individual rights, including language that the enumeration of certain rights shall not be interpreted to deny other rights retained by the states or the people . Thus was born, after ratification by the states, the Bill of Rights. These ten amendments serve to remind us of the Founders’ commitment to the protection of individual rights. The Founders wanted to protect the minority against any potential majority that may wish to use its democratic power to deny the minority their fundamental, natural rights. As George Will put it in his graduate thesis, there are certain questions that, even in an open society, are closed. The Founders were natural rights absolutists, and they were insistent that the political system they created would always protect the natural rights of an individual against the temporary whims of a transient majority. The Bill of Rights are part of the sacred canon of our political system, and they are properly revered by American Conservatives as the fundamental basis of our rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

“Everything within the state, nothing outside the state, nothing against the state.”

Benito Mussolini

Critics of the Founders, beginning most prominently with Professor Woodrow Wilson, later President Wilson, and like-minded political Progressives, express immense frustration with the design of our Constitutional republic. Progressives believe our rights come from the State. Therefore, they believe the State must take a more aggressive and central role in the lives of its citizenry, helping them to achieve a more equal and just society. They also believe mankind has progressed beyond his nature, beyond his primitive limitations, and is capable, with the proper enlightened leadership (always, curiously, found among the educated elite like Wilson himself) of achieving the dream of the ideal society. These ideas are fundamentally at odds with the Founders philosophy of natural rights and their more skeptical view of the potential of human nature. Therefore, Progressives are destined to chafe at the Constitution’s protection of individual freedoms, its preference for limited government, and its decentralization and balance of powers among the branches and the states. They heap untold amounts of scorn upon the electoral college; the makeup and means of election of senators; the need for super majorities to achieve significant changes; the filibuster; and even the bill of rights. They view these mechanisms, celebrated by Conservatives, as tragic faults of our system to overcome or eliminate. They see the Constitution as a relic of our primitive past and no longer relevant or applicable to the modern world they seek to create. And therein lies the rub. The ultimate conflict between American Conservatives and their Progressive counterparts, is, to borrow the title of an illuminating Thomas Sowell book, A Conflict of Visions.

CLOSET ELITISTS AND RACISTS?

Knowing that our Constitutional republic was born of an alternative, essentially conservative vision of humanity, Progressives realize that in order to convince the American people to adopt their vision, they must dislodge the Founders and their ideas from their revered perch in the minds of the citizenry. Therefore, we are subjected to countless Progressive critiques of the Constitution and its authors that seek to delegitimize the Founders personally, attacking their motives and sneering haughtily at them for their personal faults and foibles.

Critics often cite the Founders oft stated fears and warnings of an unchecked democracy, or a tyranny of the majority, as proof of underlying, anti-democratic sympathies. They accuse the Founders of establishing a faux democracy with a Constitution that is actually a cleverly designed mechanism intended to block the will of the people and serve only the interests of the wealthy elite. I submit these critics erroneously characterize the intentions of the Founders. They were not so keen to mention the faults of democracy because they deemed it an unworthy or undesirable political system. Having come to the logical conclusion that democracy was the only just system, they wanted to ensure that their fellow countrymen were fully aware of its limitations. It is only when we are aware of faults that are we able to address them effectively. Madison’s ‘auxiliary precautions’ and the Bill of Rights are evidence of a commitment to individual freedom within a democratic society, not a subversion of that democracy. However, because they are ideas that instantiate a system antithetical to the Progressive desire for more State power, they are disingenuously and unironically maligned as the devious, power hungry design of their elitist authors.

Most recently, the Founders have come under attack as specifically designing the Constitution to perpetuate slavery. Now, I will concede that there are some legitimate arguments to be had about the validity of the Founders philosophical assumptions that will impact whether one thinks their political designs were wise or foolish or somewhere in between. If Conservatism stands for anything, it most definitely stands for the idea that anything produced by humans is by nature imperfect and therefore not immune from criticism. There are some critiques, however, one needn’t waste time addressing seriously. They are so widely condemned, by thoughtful scholars from all political perspectives, as historically illiterate, agenda-driven pablum (yes, I’m looking at you New York Times 1619 project), that one should feel comfortable ignoring those critiques as being what the average, common sense citizen would immediately recognize as horses**t.

LET THE CONVERSATION BEGIN

My primary goal with these essays has been to illuminate to the best of my ability and understanding the underlying political philosophy of the American Conservative. Hopefully, I have succeeded in that task. With that groundwork in place, as I comment in the future on various political issues, I hope the reader will at least consider the basis for my arguments, whether one agrees with my position or not, rather than simply dismissing the conservative viewpoint with ill-informed invective.

VETERANS DAY 2020

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(Author’s note: The following is the text of a brief talk given by the author in conjunction with a Veterans Day ceremony)

Good morning.  On behalf of all veterans, thank you for taking the time to formally recognize Veterans Day.  Recently it seems our society has been too prone to quickly dismiss as irrelevant or unworthy the traditions our not so distant ancestors established, so I am glad to take part in a ceremony that honors those traditions. 

Speaking of history, I suppose I am what is known as a history “buff”.  I’m certain my long-suffering wife and son will attest to this fact, having been subjected to one too many documentaries about some obscure battle of the civil or revolutionary wars.  So, this opportunity to satisfy my historical sweet tooth was too tempting to pass up. Be not afraid, however, as I promise to inflict upon you only a small portion of the pain so ably endured by my family. If you will indulge me, I hope to use the following brief talk to encourage you to understand and appreciate Veterans Day in a new way.

There are two days in the United States set aside to honor military service: this day, and Memorial Day.  Memorial Day honors those who have given, as Lincoln so eloquently put it in his Gettysburg address, “the last full measure of devotion.”  As any veteran who fought in battle will tell you, the real heroes are the ones who did not come home.  Memorial Day, originally known as Decoration Day, due to the custom of placing flowers at the graves of the war dead, is intended to be a somber recognition of the supreme sacrifice undertaken by those honored dead on behalf of this country.  As Lincoln also said on that November day in Gettysburg, “It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.”   

So, what about Veterans Day?  I believe most people probably think of Veterans Day as simply a less somber version of Memorial Day; a day to express a more general “thank you for your service”.  While we veterans welcome any note of thanks and appreciation, I want to ask you today, and for all Veterans Days going forward, to remember and reflect upon this fact:  All veterans, officer and enlisted, upon signing on the dotted line to begin their service to this country, take an oath.  In that oath they pledge to “protect and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies foreign and domestic…”.  Think about that.  We do not pledge to protect the president, or congress, or any one person.  We do not pledge to defend a piece of land.  We pledge to protect and defend a document, a piece of parchment.  But not just any piece of parchment. Our Constitution embodies a revolutionary set of ideas and principles that were first voiced in the Declaration: We hold these truths to be self evident. All men are created equal. They are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights. That among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. We have all heard these words before, but I want you today to understand their extraordinary significance. Those ideas are the true American revolution.  They are what we mean by American exceptionalism.  We are a people and a nation spoken into existence; the first nation ever able to pinpoint the exact moment of our birth.   We are a people dedicated to a set of ideals and principles about the best way to arrange human affairs and promote human flourishing.   Being human, we, from the beginning, failed to fully live up to those principles.  Yet, we have made great progress, and today we continue the great American experiment of trying to more fully realize those ideals. 

We veterans, all the men and women who have served, or are serving, in the United States armed forces, have pledged to protect and defend, with our lives if necessary, the principles first enunciated in the Declaration of Independence and subsequently codified in the Constitution.  It is not the only means to defend and preserve these ideas for future generations. But in a world full of, shall we say, “contrary perspectives”, perspectives that are sometimes expressed with guns, and bombs, and gas chambers, and airplanes flying into buildings, it is a necessary duty that we veterans are proud to have undertaken.  

So, this Veterans Day, and on each one hereafter, thank us for our service if you wish.  But, more importantly, remind yourself of what we veterans pledge to protect and defend: the Constitution of the United States. It is for the blessings that document has endowed on this nation that I implore you to reserve your deepest gratitude.

My Conservative Sensibility: Part I

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“When it comes to politics, what are you?”

“I’m a conservative.”

“Ohh…”

Conservative, liberal, republican, democrat, progressive. I suspect most of you are like me when asked to categorize yourself politically. You simply provide your inquisitor…and let’s face it, when they ask that question, their motives are inquisitorial…with one of those shorthand descriptors.

Unfortunately, their understanding of what it means to be a conservative, or progressive, or democrat or republican, is almost certainly informed by certain assumptions and associations they have acquired from the present public discourse. In most cases, these characterizations can be quite fairly described as ranging from disingenuous distortions to malicious misrepresentations.

CONSERVE WHAT?

So what do I mean when I proclaim that I am a conservative?

Let’s begin by asking the most logical question: What is it that I am trying to conserve?

To conserve something is to protect it from harm or destruction. Depending on when and where one might be answering the question, what a conservative is trying to protect might be the Monarchy, the Soviet Union, or the Galactic Empire. I am not, however, an 18th century Englishman, a 20th century Russian politburo member, or a 25th century citizen of Tatooine. I am an American citizen in the 21st century professing to be a conservative. So, what am I trying to conserve? According to George Will, in his book The Conservative Sensibility, the correct answer to that question is simple, straightforward, and reasonable:

An American conservative desires to conserve the principles of the American founding.

AN EXCEPTIONAL IDEA

People who bristle at the idea of American exceptionalism are no doubt misapprehending the concept as some sort of jingoistic claim of national superiority. Nothing could be further from the truth. Exceptionalism in this context refers to the uniqueness of both the American founding and the revolutionary ideas upon which it was based.

Unlike any nation before it, the United States was unique in that it could pinpoint exactly when and where it came into being. To that point in history, nation states arose gradually and organically…and violently… into the entities we now recognize as individual countries. On July 4, 1776, the United States was proclaimed into being. Just as exceptional was the fact that this revolutionary proclamation was not driven by the usual catalysts, such as poverty or political oppression. The men proclaiming their independence were relatively free and prosperous Englishmen, who enjoyed more rights and material well being than most of the world at that time. This revolution was sparked by an idea, and it forever turned upside down the understanding of the relationship of man to his governing institutions.

“We have it in our power to begin the world again.”

Thomas Paine

Drawing from the political and philosophical musings of classical civilizations and Enlightenment political philosophers (particularly John Locke), and infused with a Judeo-Christian teleology, the Founders followed a line of reasoning the essence of which Jefferson poetically captured in the second line of the Declaration. To wit, Mankind, uniquely endowed by their creator with reason, can use that reason to discern certain truths (“self-evident” truths) about the nature of man. First and foremost, that man is created equally free, and as such, is endowed with certain inherent rights (natural rights), to include the right to life and the right to be free to chose his own pursuits.

All well and good. The dignity of the individual was a concept introduced by Judeo-Christian theology and expounded upon by secular philosophers before Jefferson and his pals adopted it. But the Founders took things one step further. What Jefferson proclaimed in his next sentence was the exceptional idea at the root of the American revolution:

“That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.”

Thomas Jefferson, Declaration of Independence (emphasis added)

Let me reiterate: To secure these a priori rights is the reason government exists. This is a complete inversion of the previous relationship of men to their political societies and it is the bedrock principle of American conservatism. We do not need to petition the government….be it a king, emperor, or parliament…to obtain these rights. They already belong to us as free men. We set up political systems in order to secure these rights from infringement by other men or society at large.

If you doubt the Founders commitment to this principle-if you think it a mere throwaway piece of poetic musing-notice that in the preamble to the document that describes the governing structure within which their revolutionary ideas were to be implemented, they reaffirm the principle:

“We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty, to ourselves and our posterity…”

Preamble to the Constitution of the United States of America (emphasis added)

In order to understand what it is to be a conservative, you must grasp this principle first: Government does not exist to grant the blessings of liberty. It exists, with our consent as free men, solely to secure those blessings. We, by mutual consent, agree to surrender a small portion of our natural liberty for the express and limited purpose of establishing a zone of individual freedom, bounded by the rule of law, within which to pursue happiness as we see fit.

Over the past century or so, this concept of natural rights has been under attack by many in our political and intellectual classes. They believe the Founders’ doctrine of individual, natural rights, secured by a government limited to that narrow purpose, is hopelessly inadequate for the challenges of our modern world. They believe we have outgrown those founding principles and the thinking that follows from it.

As a conservative, I believe just the opposite. The Founders principle of government as the securer of rights rather than as the source of rights is one of the great political insights. It must be reasserted, not rejected, if we are to have the best kind of republic possible in this imperfect world.

Speaking of imperfect worlds, in part two I will explore another philosophical perspective crucial to the Founders’ thinking. Accepting the truth of that idea, and understanding its implications, leads one logically to certain conclusions about the form of government best suited to secure our natural rights.

Welcome

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THE EXAMINED LIFE?

Plato tells us that during Socrates’ trial for corrupting the youth of ancient Athens, the famed philosopher, ever the scold, made a statement along the lines of:

“The unexamined life is not worth living.”

I’m sure this went over well with all his fellow Greeks scraping out their meager existence on the not exactly fertile plains of their homeland.  But old “Socrates”, like all radicals, had to speak his truth, consequences be damned.  Possessing the natural temperament of the more Aristotelian “golden mean” type (enough with the ancient Greeks already, you blowhard!), I like to imagine Plato misheard what Socrates said, possibly because it’s famously hard to enunciate after a generous dose of hemlock.  Maybe Socrates actually said:

“The unexamined life is not very fulfilling.”

To that I say, unequivocally, right on brother!

I believe we can experience a more fulfilling life if we take the time to examine more thoughtfully the things that matter.

THINGS THAT MATTER?

My interests encompass many subjects both large and small.  The true, the beautiful, the just, the good…as well as why the best cookie, hands down, no argument, is oatmeal chocolate chip (Grandma Granger, blessings be upon you).   Historians note that Thomas Jefferson organized his vast library into three main categories: reason, memory, and imagination.  These roughly translate into the subjects of philosophy/science, history, and arts/culture.  When I think about it, those subject headings encapsulate quite nicely my interests.  I suspect they might end up roughly describing the kinds of things regularly mentioned, highlighted, mused or meditated upon in this blog.

A NOTE ON TONE

We seem to have devolved into a world wherein a bumper sticker mentality prevails (twitter: curses be upon it). “Thinking” 140 characters at time is not conducive to thoughtfulness, and it leads to a lot of shouting and posturing, and, frankly, it gives me headaches.  What passes for debate is simply a lot of juvenile name calling.  Character and motives are constantly attacked while underlying ideas are never addressed.               

This blog is my refuge from that world.  I’m hoping it might be yours too.

That being said, good natured humor, irreverance, and cleverness are always welcome and encouraged.

WHY?

 “You have a lot going on in that (crazy/pea/delusional…take your pick) brain of yours” is something I have heard often from friends, family and many others over the years.  This is true.  Unfortunately, as friends, family and others are apt to also mention often, “you don’t say much.”  Also true.  So, what to do with all this “stuff” in my head?  This blog is my outlet.  It is my chance to dust off the mental furniture in my attic.  We all need to do a mental spring cleaning if we are to pursue the examined life seriously.  Exposing our ideas, particularly our biases and blindspots, to the light of day, and possibly to the reasonable critique of others, is a prerequisite for the examined life.

Now, some people prefer to accomplish their mental spring cleaning by “talking things out”, as it were.  God bless them (and the people listening!).  I find I need to write.  The exercise of expressing one’s thoughts in words can be exhausting, but it is often exhilarating.  It is also immensely clarifying.

“IF YOU CAN’T EXPLAIN IT SIMPLY, YOU DON’T UNDERSTAND IT WELL ENOUGH.”  

Albert Einstein

In order to write clearly, one must put in the time and effort to think clearly.  If I don’t know why I think what I think, how can I explain it to another? How can I hope to convince another, if that is my aim?  How can I defend my point of view from attack?  How can I be open to seeing it another way?  Sit down sometime and try writing an essay on any topic. I’ll bet by the time you’re finished you will be a hell of a lot more clear about what you think about that topic and why.  Who knows, you might have changed your mind about it, too.

 “HOPE IS A GOOD THING…MAYBE THE BEST OF THINGS.”

Andy Dufresne

So, if you’re still reading, maybe you’ll check in from time to time.   I hope so.  Maybe you’ll want to respond to something or add your own thoughts.  I hope so.  Maybe you’ll introduce me to an interesting idea or drop a bit of knowledge on me, or maybe I’ll do the same for you.  I hope…