A Pledge...(C**p I will Not Remain Silent About)

Several weeks ago, on the "Popehat" blog, "Clark" had a post called "consistency", in which he opened by saying that:

Here's a fun game to play:

Skewer partisans on the other side of the divide over the fact that during the last administration they had their panties in a knot over the president doing X, Y, and Z, but during this administration (with the appropriate brand of either Coke or Pepsi sitting behind the desk in the Oval Office), they're mysteriously silent.

 He ended the post with:

Here's my challenge to you (and to myself):

1) when the wrong brand of soft drink is behind the desk (whether that's right now or in a few years), make a list of the utterly horrible illegal crap he (or she) is doing, day in and day out. And post it someplace public, like your blog.

Now, here's the tricky bit:

2) title the blog post "crap I will not remain silent about … even when my own guy is doing it 4 or 8 years from now"

And so this is my challenge to myself and to you.

We have reached a point in this country where the President does what he wants with our military power under a thin veneer of justification, makes himself the cheerleader (and major drafter of, and negotiator for) legislation to achieve his goals (these actions a far cry from the Youngstown case's statement that: " In the framework of our Constitution, the President's power to see that the laws are faithfully executed refutes the idea that he is to be a lawmaker. The Constitution limits his functions in the lawmaking process to the recommending of laws he thinks wise and the vetoing of laws he thinks bad") and is never held accountable for any action, not even through the voting booth.

It is enough.

A common complaint among the literati who vent so often in the press, in blogs, on stage, and in classrooms is that being bound by some dead Founders' interpretation of the Constitution is foolhardy or evil, for what could such a person know of our time, now?

What the Founders knew of importance had little to do with how we (for instance) feel about sexual activity among adults, and everything to do with knowledge and experience of human nature. When George Washington warned about "foreign entanglements", he was not only warning against engaging in wars overseas or permanent alliances with questionable allies - rather, his deeper knowledge was of human nature, which was apparent to him and every Founder. They knew that "[i]n framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself." The Founders knew the imperfectability of human nature, when perfection depends solely on the individual to exercise restraint - the example of Cincinnatus notwithstanding.

Chesterton had an analogy involving a gate, used to illustrate his brand of traditionalism:

In the matter of reforming things, as distinct from deforming them, there is one plain and simple principle; a principle which will probably be called a paradox. 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." 

Chesterton never mentioned a gatekeeper, for in the common law, the law and tradition are the gatekeepers. Now we have those (compassionate conservativism, blind social justice, progressivism, etc.) who, in the name of shining goals (education, healthcare, solving Libya, Iraq, etc.) are willing to throw down the gates of law and tradition that prevent achievement of those goals. But, the gate thrown, the fence torn, the impediment weakened and discarded, the way is clear - those with different goals and different ideas, upon taking the reins of power, will not, with rare exception, either be able to restrain others or themselves. Most will not even be aware of the former constrictions, or care to find out.

To paraphrase C.S. Lewis, every right or benefit acquired by the people via increased government power is a current or future power acquired over the people as well. How many scrap dealers failed because of Cash for Clunkers, when the price for scrap aluminum plummeted? How many poor could no longer obtain a vehicle because the market for old, but running cars, was crushed with the cars themselves? How many benefited from the failure of capitalism that was the bank bailout? The auto bailout? All abuses of government power - propping the few at the hands of the many for the benefit of the powerful. And who will say that such powers, having been used and approved by silence or applause, will be used benignly at all? We have only the statements of the wielders of the current power, and they neither have nor can enforce a guarantee that the successors to that power will abide.

All of history is against it. All of human nature is against it.

It is enough.