I have just read perhaps one of the most important blog posts ever to appear before my eyes. I think every American should read it, too, regardless of their political persuasion; it’s that important and timely. Please consider:
The notion that the president has the right to act in violation of duly enacted laws would have been repellent to all the founders, including the great American revolutionary Thomas Paine, who wrote in his legendary 1776 pamphlet Common Sense that those who claim the power President Bush is claiming — namely, to act in violation of the law — are claiming the power of a king.
-from Glenn Greenwald, a specialist in Constitutional law, as quoted in the article Where did she go? Why did she leave?, TheLeftCoaster.com, 10 June 2006.
How about this one:
If you interpret the Constitution’s saying that the president is commander in chief to mean that the president can do anything he wants and can ignore the laws you don’t have a constitution: you have a king.
-from Grover Norquist, a ‘founding father’ of Reaganism, asw quoted in the article Ibid.
There’s little I can add to this brilliantly written analysis. Which is why I’m refraining from commentary and, instead, simply bringing attention to it.
Yes, it is that important… please read it now!
2 responses so far ↓
1 Paula // Jun 12, 2006 at 12:46 pm
Hi Richard, I feel sick… I wonder if it is not so much that people don’t care as much as people don’t know. I haven’t heard much of anything on the news. I used to think we would hear about it if something important was going on. People who can expose dangers are under threat, and even the judiciary is nearly futile. Attempts to get this in check are being dismissed. Is it already too late? I don’t want my sons to be taken away.
(RH-note: this comment was originally sent to me via email;posted here with permission from Paula)
2 Richard // Jun 12, 2006 at 12:48 pm
it is a sickening thing, paula… an without trying to sound the alarm to loudly, i suspect we’re either right on the verge, or have now crossed the line entirely. Governmental reform seems a distant memory and privelage that we, as a nation, have let slip through our fingers.
It seems to me that our next transformative context will be either revolution or collapse. The decision over which will be decided by the people. If people decide to take action, revolution will stir and things will get ugly. If people decide to watch and see, the ineffectiveness of totalitarian policies will take their inevitable toll and it will still get ugly but by poverty and scarcity (vs. by violence and bloodshed if by revolution).
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