A house divided against itself cannot stand.
Just over 150 years ago, Abraham Lincoln warned us that "a house divided against itself cannot stand". While the image of national disunion, prophetic as it was, was what captured the national imagination, his actual message was not that the house would fall, not that the Union would crumble, but that
It will become all one thing or all the other. Either the opponents of slavery will arrest the further spread of it... or its advocates will push it forward, till it shall become alike lawful in all the States...
His speech was a call to action, a warning that the Union was on a path that would lead to that which the North felt was inconceivable, the full legalization of slavery. It was a warning of the course the Republic was on, unless direct and strong action was taken to avert it. Sadly his speech was not strong enough to rally him the support needed to attain the Senate, let alone achieve his goal. Rather, it wasn't until the house actually began to fall, that states seceded, that a war was fought, that he achieved his goal and then paid its price.
I can easily imagine the horror he felt as his nation trod relentlessly towards slavery or disunion. I can imagine it because our house, our houses today are divided. The nation is divided, the Republican and Democratic parties are each divided, the proponents of civil liberties are divided. Polarization is rampant, and it endangers what we cherish.
A bit over 250 years ago Franklin wrote the following
As to the other two acts. The Massachusetts must suffer all the hazards and mischiefs of war, rather than admit the alteration of their charters and laws by parliament. "They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety".
The last quote, which he published in slightly altered form a few years later, is reminiscent of his maxim of 270 years ago to "Sell not virtue to purchase wealth, nor Liberty to purchase power."
All of this is advice that is extremely timely. All of it came to mind as I read Glenn Greenwald and Keith Olbermann, two staunch and outspoken defenders of our civil liberties and tradition of the rule of law not men, bickering with each other, sparked by Senator Obama's abandonment of his pledge to fight against retroactive immunity and the expansion of presidential power, presumably to increase his chances of being elected. All this while we as a nation take step after inexorable step away from habeas corpus, away from posse comitatus, away from the separation of powers, away from the rule of law towards the rule of men, the ever strengthening unenumerated inherent power of the man who is the decider in unitary executive.
The time has come to put aside the bickering between Obama Democrats and PUMA "Clintonians" and put a stop to the Republican advancement of the authoritarian destruction of our civil liberties. The time has come for civil libertarians such as Greenwald and Olbermann to put aside the bickering between them. The time has come for Obama to refuse to sell liberty to purchase power. The time has come for virtue over greed. The time has come to realize that it is not immigrants, legal or illegal who are stealing our jobs, but corporations and wealthy CEOs that are shipping those jobs overseas. The time has come to realize that Islamic radicals cannot steal our freedom, only we can sell it out of fear and greed.
The time has come for Republicans to stop sacrificing every conservative principle, every liberty in the name of party loyalty. Authoritarian rule by a unified executive that can at a whim nationalize the National Guard, and employ the Armed Forces in the US in "other circumstances", augmenting that with mercenaries who operate outside both American law and that of the nation they are "helping", and law breaking public carriers immunized at the word of the unified executive--these are not conservative values. Crippling national debt is not fiscal conservatism whether it is brought on by a spendthrift congress or a Commander in Chief who refuses to budget or collect taxes for America's longest war.
The Supreme Court recently reaffirmed that the Constitution valued habeas corpus even before it affirmed the Bill of Rights. And out of party loyalty, and fear of stateless terrorists, Republicans and Conservatives pilloried them for it. What conservative principle is served by fear mongering, of surrendering our most fundamental rights? None! The only reason that Liberals and Conservatives are fighting over this issue is because of what side the other is on.
A house divided against itself cannot stand. PUMA, Greenwald, Olbermann, Get A Grip! Sell not Liberty to purchase power. Obama, stand firm! Do not capitulate on principles for fear of being soft on terrorism. It is not "Strong on Terrorism" to give up essential liberty to obtain a little safety! It certainly isn't soft on terrorism to hold law breakers accountable--even if they were asked to break the law by the president.
We have allowed polarization to divide our country and our parties. We have allowed fear to cause us to sell out our principles and our liberties. Great Republics do not fall to small bands of fanatics. They fall when fear and divisiveness cause the people to surrender their rights and freedoms to the Leader, the Dictator, the Emperor. They fall when they allow their armies, their mercenaries, their spies, their police to be turned on them. They fall when they allow the government to keep a "little list" of people who cannot move freely, when they allow free speech to be confined to zones, when the leader's agents are immune from the law. They fall when the wealthy can buy the law.
Franklin, Jefferson, Washington, Hamilton, Lincoln, Eisenhower all have warned us repeatedly against fear, greed, manipulation, the combination of money and military power. People! Stop! Think! Stop hating the enemy. Stop fearing the bogeyman. Dear me. Obama and Clinton differ in the details. Greenwald and Olbermann are on the same side of all the issues. They're calling each other names over who should be blamed for what. It doesn't matter who is blamed! What matters is what we do! Anthony Kennedy is a Conservative for great Ghu's sake.
When did it become a great Conservative value to fear monger!? Scalia says that Americans will die if we follow habeas corpus? The McCain campaign thinks it would be good for Republican political aspirations if after 8 years of the Republican Bush administration a terrorist attack was successful!? Republicans are rooting for Al Qaeda? Huh? The failure of the Republicans to keep us safe means we need more years of them? What?
Stop! Take a breath. Let's take a quick survey: Small government, low taxes, balanced budgets, states rights, free market economics, original intent, strict constructionism. Aren't those conservative values? Where did they go? The Republicans are so afraid of dissent among the ranks that they are willing to sell conservative principles for party unity and loyalty and follow a Republican president wherever he will lead.
The Democrats have so sanctified and so demonized their own leaders that they are willing to follow the Republicans into the same unprincipled "rule by men, not laws" future. The Dems, and the advocates of civil liberties are so focused on casting blame that they will attack their own allies.
Fear and division.
A House divided against itself cannot stand.
Sell not virtue to purchase wealth, nor Liberty to purchase power.
We have nothing to fear, but fear itself.
Please, get a grip.
Thank you. I'll be quiet now. We return you to the civil war, already in progress.
Comments
In practice, I just do not see the difference between Democrats and Republicans that you seem to. As for a house divided.....The Democrat Party is marxist to moderate socilaist. The Republican Party socialist to moderate socialist. *What you do is what you are, not what you say.
Still....A very interesting post!
*lightfoot letters
Interesting reading...I do just not see the difference between the Democrat Party and the Republican Party that you seem to. The Democrat Party is marxist to moderate socialist. The Republican Party is socialist to moderate socialist. *What you do is what you are, not what you say.
*lightfoot letters
might be a duplicate post
It is amazing to me to see basic conservative and liberal principles thrown out to make way for political rhetoric.
I think the reason so many people are critical of Obama (myself included) is that he is proving to be no different than any other politician while presenting himself as a principled civil servant. Thus his constant back sliding from stands of principle is notable. My wife is still an Obama supporter however for his stated aims in his books to return to the principles the country was founded on which is something that I can guess from your posts that you would also appreciate. But do you buy that message? I don't, and so as usual I won't be voting Democrat - not until we have Ranked Choice Voting in National Elections.
McCain has shown little effort to distance himself from Bush Admin's policy and its monster - the unitary executive - despite a political past at odds with the president and his policies. I see this as dangerous, and so he's to me also a bad choice made worse by his endorsement of Bush foreign policy.
I am not unlike Joseph Heller in seeing the pointlessness of Presidential Elections - especially when it comes to the issues you've outlined above about a house divided amidst erosion of civil liberties as well as the balance of power between our branches of gov't.
Kenneth Clark in his series on Civilisation (it is a Book as well as a Documentary) often came back to the theme of confidence. He believed that Civilisations that lose their confidence fall apart. And by that he meant confidence in the Civilization as opposed to any particular individual's self-confidence. That is the danger of terrorism. It strikes at our "glue". And yet what that means is that our fear of Terrorism causes just as much harm as any plane flown into a building - nor does our state of fear make us any better prepared to prevent this from happening again. Of course this is an argument of the US's left directed against the hardliners - those who depend upon Republican voters. I see again and again on these boards as well self-proclaimed right wingers raking "liberals" over the coals for a similar crime - Anti-Americanism or Anti-Patriotism etc... which if true would signify a serious lack of confidence in America on the left.
Its very interesting that each "side" has the same interest, but uses it to attack the "other".
You ask,
I'm afraid I don't believe that he does, in fact, constantly backslide. On FISA and retro-active immunity, he has more than backslid. He has caved and he is just dead wrong to have done so. I will not defend him on this issue. He's wrong and if I can pressure him to change I will, and have tried.
But having said that, I find the rest of the "rush to the center"/"move to the right"/"flip-flop" narrative to be entirely unconvincing. One of the place that I post Vox Libertas is over at the Daily Kos, and over there, someone posted a diary that I agree with and have been pointing people to: "Obama, the flip-flopper? Give me a break". I recommend following the link and reading the befre and after quotes. I had a shorter similar list I was putting together, but this one does a very nice job.
Obama was like my 4th or 5th pick among the primary candidates. He's too hawkish fr my tastes, for instance. But I like several things about him. His stand on taking PAC and lobbyist money and the fact that he has taken stands all along that are not entirely popular in his party suggest to me that he actually has the principles we would like to see.
Examples are his agreement with the Supreme Court in turning out the Washington DC anti-handgun law. Since I believe the first shots of the Revolution were over the Right To Bear Cannons/Weapons of War in private hands, he doesn't go far enough for me, but as a Constitutional Law specialist, you would expect him to have to recognize the second ammendment and he does. And did before.
Another example is the whole "Faith Based Initiative" thing. He started both his politica careere and his religious life as a community organizer working with churches. How can anybody have missed his belief in the power and importance of faith based organizations as a tool for social justice? He has never made a secret of it, nor of his belief that the Democrats should welcome and even court people of faith and be willing to talk about their faith and its role in their lives.
He has said these things all along and still won support on the left. You might ask why the right tries to paint this man, who is a moderate on gun control, church and state, and abortion rights, and who they were criticizing for being too militaristic in his stance on Pakistan, advocating actions that Bush took 6 months later, as "the most liberal senator".
I am well and fully sick of Obama- and Clinton-supporters who refuse to vote for the other when they are probably the two primary candidates with the closest political views, Obama being just a smidge to the right of Hillary. And I am really sick of lefties who think it is cute to call the other side names rather than addressing issues, but at the moment, the so-called "right", the neo-con Republicans are doing a much sleazier job of lying about the other side than Obama's people, and McCain is "flip-flopping" far more wildly and far more often.
I have jope, which may prove vain, that Obama has some integrity. I have lost that hope for both the Republicans in general and McCain in particular.
First off:
My fault. Apparently your comment needed to be approved and I got distracted away from here. I've approved both. I can delete the first if you like. I kept them cuz the wording was a little different and I didn't want to choose for you.
Umm... There certainly is a bit of socialism there, but nothing compared to the Europeans.
The Republicans, speaking of the rank and file tend to still be fairly conservative and to believe in the conservative values I cited. The party leadership and the current administration, on the other hand are corporatist authoritarians of a sufficiently virulent strain to match the textbook definition of "fascist" as used by the original fascisti. Their scare tactics seem to be pulling the real conservatives to supporting them for the sake of party unity and the security of the state using standard corporatist authoriitarian tactics.
Both parties seem to be fairly fully in the grips of corporatist lobbies and special interest gropsu. I have hopes for the grassroots, the netroots and a few young or dedicated individuals, but they get shaken and disappinted fairly often.
Still, what's a guy to do. Let it go completely to pot and wait to water the tree of liberty, feeding it its natural manure? I'd rather not.