Saturday, March 31, 2007
WHO ELECTED A KING?
This is a wonderful country. I am proud to be an American. I love the traditions of this great nation. I love its history. I respect its founding patriots and intellectuals.
None of our early leaders was perfect, nor did they always agree. The history of our nation is not entirely honorable, but it is mostly so. Though we are flawed as a people, we have a great legacy.
America has no place for kings, nor does this country accept any nobility. We recognize no hereditary titles, nor do we break our citizens into classes. Our laws do not permit the granting of titles, nor do they mandate forms of personal address for any gentry. Once our Constitution was amended after the great civil conflict, and again last century on suffrage, we became a nation of equals before the law.
Maintaining freedom requires a system of checks and balances. Very wisely this republic was organized under a constitution with just such a system, as well as a bill of rights. We have the legislative, the executive, and the judicial. Our freedom and our survival as a democracy depend upon all three functioning well -- none dominating the others.
While some may still question the legitimacy of Mr. Bush as president, nobody recalls electing him king. Nevertheless, the republican congress fell into step, giving Mr. Bush whatever he asked. After 9/11 he wanted an irrelevant war in Iraq, and they led in giving him that. He wanted unfettered powers in the name of security, and they gave him those.
The Bush administration has broken laws protecting privacy of telecphone, e-mail, and bank accounts; broken laws and treaties governing the treatment of prisoners; ignored habeas corpus laws, rules of justice, and international kidnapping prohibitions; justified torture of prisoners in custody; politicized prosecutions; broke secrecy laws on intelligence agents for political reasons; and sponsored a stable of conspirators from the White House.
Mr. Bush claims he is "The Decider." Is that not a monarchial assertion? Arogantly he proceeds in escalating a war that he knows lacks popular or congressional majority support. He goes opposite from informed study group recommendations. Yet his party members go right on supporting him in Congress, as though somebody named him King, and they must be the Tories.
It may be true that Mr. Bush is under delusions of grandeur and power. His party faithful appear to encourage that notion. No doubt some of his friends from the religious right have told him that he has been anointed by God.
Somebody needs to tell him the truth. We don't have kings. Even Samuel told the Israelites that God was displeased with their clamor for a king.
It is too bad that Oklahoma has no real representation in the Senate and little in the House. We have one senator with the reputation of an ignorant jackass, while the other vacillates between being a clown and a zealot and never passing through normalcy to get from one to the other.
The republicans in the Congress have done nothing to curtail the rampant and reckless abuses of power by Mr. Bush. Unfortunately they are continuing to compound their errors. Will someone please shout that in their ears?
Dr. Edwin E. Vineyard, AKA The Militant Moderate
None of our early leaders was perfect, nor did they always agree. The history of our nation is not entirely honorable, but it is mostly so. Though we are flawed as a people, we have a great legacy.
America has no place for kings, nor does this country accept any nobility. We recognize no hereditary titles, nor do we break our citizens into classes. Our laws do not permit the granting of titles, nor do they mandate forms of personal address for any gentry. Once our Constitution was amended after the great civil conflict, and again last century on suffrage, we became a nation of equals before the law.
Maintaining freedom requires a system of checks and balances. Very wisely this republic was organized under a constitution with just such a system, as well as a bill of rights. We have the legislative, the executive, and the judicial. Our freedom and our survival as a democracy depend upon all three functioning well -- none dominating the others.
While some may still question the legitimacy of Mr. Bush as president, nobody recalls electing him king. Nevertheless, the republican congress fell into step, giving Mr. Bush whatever he asked. After 9/11 he wanted an irrelevant war in Iraq, and they led in giving him that. He wanted unfettered powers in the name of security, and they gave him those.
The Bush administration has broken laws protecting privacy of telecphone, e-mail, and bank accounts; broken laws and treaties governing the treatment of prisoners; ignored habeas corpus laws, rules of justice, and international kidnapping prohibitions; justified torture of prisoners in custody; politicized prosecutions; broke secrecy laws on intelligence agents for political reasons; and sponsored a stable of conspirators from the White House.
Mr. Bush claims he is "The Decider." Is that not a monarchial assertion? Arogantly he proceeds in escalating a war that he knows lacks popular or congressional majority support. He goes opposite from informed study group recommendations. Yet his party members go right on supporting him in Congress, as though somebody named him King, and they must be the Tories.
It may be true that Mr. Bush is under delusions of grandeur and power. His party faithful appear to encourage that notion. No doubt some of his friends from the religious right have told him that he has been anointed by God.
Somebody needs to tell him the truth. We don't have kings. Even Samuel told the Israelites that God was displeased with their clamor for a king.
It is too bad that Oklahoma has no real representation in the Senate and little in the House. We have one senator with the reputation of an ignorant jackass, while the other vacillates between being a clown and a zealot and never passing through normalcy to get from one to the other.
The republicans in the Congress have done nothing to curtail the rampant and reckless abuses of power by Mr. Bush. Unfortunately they are continuing to compound their errors. Will someone please shout that in their ears?
Dr. Edwin E. Vineyard, AKA The Militant Moderate
