The Battle Is Joined – Can The GOP Win It?

By: Roderick T. Beaman

Michael Steele, chairman of the Republican National Committee has stated that the party should engage Barack Obama directly and not simply the Democratic Party, on the issues. He is 100 per cent correct. Barack Obama should be the target and if the GOP plays its cards correctly, a very big if, it can turn the country around. But, it must be willing to adopt a no prisoners, scorched earth policy.

The very first challenge will be the Supreme Court nominee, Sonia Sotomayor. Barack Obama has made a brilliant political move. In nominating a daughter of Puerto Rican immigrants to the Court, he will have succeeded in ingratiating himself with American Hispanics, the fastest growing group in the country and one from which the Republicans have often garnered significant support such among Cuban-Americans.

They will have to tread carefully but she must be completely vetted. From the early descriptions, there is no doubt that she has a decidedly unconstitutional view of what the constitution is supposed to mean. Her vaunted ‘never forgetting the effects her decisions have on people’ concerns are not supposed to matter in law.

And talk about playing to the gallery. Everyone on Obama’s short list was a female. Give the devil his due; he knows how to play politics.

Notice, this lawyer who taught constitutional law, doesn’t want judges who view the law as an abstract but as a tool for results, namely the results he wants. In other words, he doesn’t care a whit about the document, and evidently his nominee doesn’t either. Batten down the hatches guys. This may make Earl Warren and William O. Douglas seem like paragons of judicial in restraint.

So, given the political realities of the situation, how can this nomination be fought? As usual, history can be instructive.

During his 1968 presidential campaign, Richard Nixon promised to nominate strict constructionists to the Court who would base their decisions on the original text and apparent intent of the Founders. To make good on his promise Nixon, nominated Clement Haynsworth of South Carolina as an Associate Justice. There was no disputing his qualifications but there were claims that he was anti-integration and anti-labor.

What sank the Haynsworth nomination though was the revelation of a possible ethics violation. It came out that he had made a decision favorable to The Brunswick Corporation in an antitrust case. After the decision but before it was announced, he had authorized his broker to purchase some Brunswick bonds. The Keepers of our Consciences railed, one righteous attorney writing in The New York Times that even the possibility of a mere five-dollar gain should disqualify any candidate for the Court. The nomination went down 55-45.

Sotomayor should be subjected to the same scrutiny of her ethics and her obvious disregard for the fundamental document of this land. If any single questionable dealing can be found, the Republicans can cite the Democrats’ own words attacking the Haynsworth nomination as precedent. Unfortunately, given the fact that they kept their swords sheathed over the Stephen Breyer nomination, a man with a far more suspect ethics trail than Haynsworth, I’m not optimistic. If she comes up short, the GOP should do everything it can to defeat her and go to the public and declare, carefully and exactly why in as many venues as possible.

In these cases, it is important to realize that the American public has a collective intelligence and that it will respond positively to straightforward honesty. Much of Barry Goldwater’s appeal was due to just that. If they fail to stop her, they will at least thrust the Constitution into the public debate.

I disagree with other libertarian and conservative columnists who characterize the public as Boobus Americanis. That is not the way to win the battle. The American public is extremely perceptive and will see what is shown to them. It’s our job to do just that.

A number of years back, a Republican member of Congress, probably the Senate, suggested that every single bill considered by Congress have to include a citation of the provision in the Constitution that authorizes it. John Glenn then complained that if they’d had to do that all the time, no bills would ever have gotten passed. Quite so.

John Glenn is a classic case in point of the views of someone who has spent his entire life feeding at the public trough. After his career as a Marine pilot and astronaut, he went to the Senate. The self-appointed leader of the original seven astronauts, once he took that first overhyped flight into space, he became a full time publicity seeker to the resentment of some of the others. He never once shrank from an opportunity to get himself in front of camera. The country was spared him going to the White House when his campaign for the Democratic nomination crashed and burned like his Senate campaign should have.

But that is a program Steele and the Republican leadership must resurrect. It will be an opportunity to bring the Constitution into America’s living rooms, social clubs, schools, bars, etc. where it should have been all along. All discussions about bills should be centered on what they do for our freedoms. It will be another educational opportunity for the public that has been undereducated about the Constitution, probably intentionally, by a government-sponsored school system that wants to keep the people ignorant about the fundamental document that is supposed to limit the power of government. And by the way, isn’t that a built in conflict of interest that should be publicized?

And while the GOP is at it with prospective programs and bills, it should debate the constitutionality of all existing federal programs and departments etc., including the various militaries and federal law enforcement agencies that may pose a greater threat to our freedoms and safety than all the other programs combined.

There is no doubt that the Founders were very afraid of standing armies. One of the precipitating factors in our rebellion against the Crown was the arrogance displayed by His Majesty’s armed forces that were stationed in the colonies. They strutted and swaggered down streets, provoking some of the reactions that undoubtedly will occur again as the United States Army’s Northern Command goes into full action and even enforces the tyrannical decisions that this administration will try to enforce. That must be part of the debate as well.

The GOP must bring the battle to the enemy. It also must be ready for the inevitable such as the Democrats throwing in their faces, the budgetary excesses of George W. Bush, as they already have. Its leaders must concede that and criticize it, if it is to reclaim that high road, and it must be willing to seize this opportunity.

I have read that the Chinese word for problem is the same as the word for opportunity. The GOP’s near devastated status is the one final chance it has to confront the ideology of the completely Marxist Democratic Party and make no mistake about it, the Democatic Party is Marxist. From Barack Obama through Barbara Boxer, Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid, if there is a Democrat committed to constitutionally limited government, I don’t know of one.

The GOP must be willing to force the debate. It must be willing to make Democrats admit that they despise the Constitution or to try to wriggle out of it. It should be an interesting spectacle.

With that, they could sign their death warrants.

I am not alone in predicting that by 2011 or 2012, rioting will break out as either the federal government defaults on its obligations or cranks up the printing presses and vaults us into a Mozambique like inflationary spiral. If it happens, it won’t be a pretty sight.

This may sound extreme but these are extreme times. The opportunity is historic.

THE FIRE THIS TIME – PART ONE THE PRELUDE

“Published originally at EtherZone.com : republication allowed with this notice and hyperlink intact.”

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