Mr. Moderate

You ought to read John Dean’s article about impeaching presidents. Dean is best known for telling the truth to Congress right at the point when the consequences of telling the truth were the worst for the President of the United States. But Dean is (was?) an old-style conservative and there were just certain ethical boundary lines he would not cross, even if it meant severe damage to the nation, his President, and the Republican Party. Dean’s article makes clear that most old-style conservatives maintain certain bedrock ethical principles which they would hold to no matter what. Dean ends his story with these words:

Disturbingly, it has been clear for some time that Bush and Cheney did indeed lie – and that their lies fit within a clear, extensive pattern of abuse of power. Yet condemnation from Congressional Republicans has yet to be heard. Sadly, it seems possible that today’s Republicans — unlike Wiggins and the other Nixon apologists who changed their minds when confronted with proven presidential lies — have no moral lines that they will draw.

I wrote yesterday about the “win by any means” archetype, which unfortunately includes lawyers, politicians, cops, military members, and criminals. Dean points out that elder conservatives didn’t use to lack moral boundary lines. It is only the newer conservatives (or “neocons”) that align most perfectly into this archetype. And Dean isn’t the only one noticing this change. In an article dated last Wednesday (7/23/08), Paul Craig Roberts, another “old school” conservative, former Assistant Secretary of the Treasury, Associate Editor of the Wall Street Journal editorial page, and a Contributing Editor to the National Review also wrote that the Republican Party was now the worst enemy of American values. And I consider myself to be among them. Please read my own “Confessions of a Goldwater Republican.”

So, what do all these people (Dean, Roberts, Goldwater and myself) have in common? None of us are willing to see the Constitution of the United States disrespected in any way. We all have an ethical floor which requires respect for the founding principles of our democracy as enunciated by that document.

In 2004, Dean wrote a book: “Worse Than Watergate: The Secret Presidency of George W. Bush.” The essence of that book’s claims was that Bush and Cheney were running roughshod over basic principles of Constitutional Law and that the violations of bedrock ethical principles were “worse than Watergate.” But Dean notes in his recent article that ignorance about Watergate is widespread in members of Congress. This is inexplicable given that the Watergate scandal caused such major changes in the way our government was run, ostensibly to prevent things like that from happening again. And obviously, information about the Watergate scandal is only a mouse-click away from anybody with an Internet connection.

Unfortunately, the modern Republican Party has adopted a mantra that the only ethical principles that matter are those from the Bible of the Evangelical Christian religion. Where the Constitution of the United States in any way contradicts what the Bible says ought to be done, then the Constitution is wrong. If the Constitution is wrong in any respect, it is obviously not worthy of respect in any respect at all, so we might as well forget about it. What other explanation can there be for the almost universal repudiation of bedrock Constitutional principles among Republican politicians? As Roberts notes in his piece:

The neoconned Republican Party is the greatest threat America has ever faced. Let me tell you why.

How many Republicans can you name who respect and honor the Constitution? There are Ron Paul, Bob Barr, and who? The ranks of Republican constitutional supporters quickly grow thin.

The reason is that Republicans view the Constitution as a coddling device for criminals and terrorists. Republicans think the Constitution can be set aside for evil-doers and kept in place for everyone else. But without the Constitution we only have the government’s word as to who is an evil-doer.

Of course, it must be noted that Bob Barr is the current Libertarian Party candidate for President of the United States and is thus no longer really a member of the Republican Party. And Ron Paul ran for President on the same Libertarian Party banner back in 1988. These men are both relics of an earlier era when Republicans stood for nationalism, constitutionalism, and noninterventionism. They don’t fit within a modern Republican Party that is committed to economic globalism, world hegemony, and winning by any means. The disparity between these two conservative camps is again clearly delineated by Roberts:

Those of us who think America is the Constitution, and that loyalty means loyalty to the Constitution, not to office holders or to a political party or to a foreign country, are regarded by Republicans as “anti-American.”

John Dean , Barry Goldwater (known as “Mr. Conservative”), and other “true conservatives” (possibly even including the likes of Michael Savage) would probably agree with this assessment. The question is this: is your primary loyalty to the nation as a whole and to the principles upon which it was founded? Or, is your primary loyalty to your social, political, or religious group and the nation be damned if it disagrees with what your group asserts? People who are group loyalists are the true enemies of America. They are not out to “conserve” America at all, but rather to dominate it and destroy any aspect of America which challenges their right to power. We must not allow the ethically-challenged to continue to govern. In his recent article, after reviewing the record of the Bush-Cheney administration, Roberts had this to say:

I am confident that the Democrats, too, will make a mess. But can they beat this record?

We must get the Republicans totally out of power, or we will have no country left for the Democrats to mess up.

I know that a lot of us agree that we don’t want to vote for a Democrat. But voting for Bob Barr isn’t a real option. To force the Republican Party to re-think its bedrock principles, it must be thrown out of power so completely and dramatically that the body snatchers who’ve gained control will be shocked and awed by the completeness of their fall from power. To accomplish that end goal, all true Republicans must vote for any and all Democrats up and down the ticket this coming November. The Democrats will mess up, as Roberts suggests, above. But it won’t be as bad as the fascist dictatorship that the neocons are giving us. If we don’t act now, there might not be a Constitution in force at all when we get our next opportunity to “throw the bums out.” So, just do it now!