Shouldn't You Be Trying To Nationalize Something?

First off, sorry to all 11 of my readers (hi Mom) for the dearth of posts these past couple of weeks. I haven't quit and Chucky Schumer's Fairness Enforcement Squad has yet to discover my undisclosed bunker deep beneath the Blanchette Bridge. Politics have been a bit trying lately with the November election results. I wouldn't say recent events have depressed me, its more of a fatigue. One of my cardinal rules is not to let events outside of my control influence my quality of life, and there's no way I'd let Barry Obama and Barney "Lisp'n 'n Pimp'n" Frank affect my general happiness. So I've taken a bit of a sabbatical from politics the past few weeks. I've gone out of my way to avoid all news and have thus been a bit out of the loop. Since my blog normally depends on me reading/seeing something that interests/enrages me enough to write, I haven't really had anything to say lately (I'm shocked the internet has been able to continue to function in my absence). That said, politics have managed to invade my retreat from the world, and thusly I am forced to address it in my own insignificant way. What, you ask, has politics gotten its swinish, gormandizing hands upon to rouse me? College Football.

Stay with me here, this is, unfortunately, indeed a political post. Many of you may remember before the election, Barry called for a playoff in College Football on two separate occasions. Never mind that I doubt Barry sees the difference between a Nickle Defense and his Military Budget, there's a bigger issue here than Barry's street cred as far as sports goes. Does the President Elect seek to use the power of the Federal government to institute a playoff?

Let me be clear. I desperately want a College Football playoff. In my opinion it would be bigger than the NCAA Basketball Tournament or, dare I say, even the Super Bowl. The fact that BCS Conferences and University Presidents have blocked the playoff movement makes me so violently angry that I have to fight the urge to stab some cute woodland creature. The shear awesomeness of even an 8 team playoff is the stuff of my wet dreams. That said, how College Football chooses to crown its champion is NONE OF THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT'S DAMN BUSINESS.

"But pissed of Midwestern blogger guy," you may ask. "Doesn't Barry have the right to his opinion on a playoff, even if he's going to be Head of State?" Well of course he does. I certainly don't begrudge him his opinion on sports, I happen to wholeheartedly agree with him on this subject (And yes, agreeing with Barry O did take a year off my life just as surely as if you had hooked me up to the torture device from The Princess Bride (Shut up, I'll watch anything with Peter Faulk in it)). My problem is that I don't trust Barry to remain a civilian fan, especially when Congressmen from both sides of the aisle keep proposing that the Federal Government impose a playoff on College Football by law. Seriously.

Just yesterday, 3 Congressmen introduced a Bill to "prohibit the marketing, promotion and advertising of a postseason game as a 'national championship' football game, unless it is the result of a playoff system." This is a Republican. From Texas. Aren't they supposed to be conservative? I know Texas got screwed out of a birth in the National Championship, but do we really need the Federal f'ing Government to remedy this, thereby getting its dirty, dirty, fingers into College Football? The Representative, Joe Barton, explained his position thusly: "In some years, the sport's national championship winner was left unsettled, and at least one school was left out of the many millions of dollars in revenue that accompany the title. Despite repeated efforts to improve the system, the controversy rages on." So what? In 8th grade I didn't make the boys' basketball team despite nailing the frigging tryout. I didn't demand Federal intervention. Do Republicans even know what conservatism means anymore? Less government. Less! Less! Less! Even when we feel the central government may be able to adequately resolve a problem, we seek to restrain it if to do so it must move beyond its specifically enumerated powers. My beloved Missouri Tigers were screwed out of an Orange Bowl birth last season in favor of the Kansas Jayhawks (who are the embodiment of pure evil, I might add). Did I lobby for Lawrence, Kansas to be deservedly destroyed by a tactical nuclear missile? No. Why? Because I'm a freaking conservative. The Federal Government has no right to decide who plays in what game or how.

What could possibly justify Federal intervention? The Interstate Commerce Clause? I'm not quite sure that fits with the founders' original intent. I must have missed the section of the Federalist Papers where Madison elaborates on the Constitution with regards to Collegiate Sports. True, most members of the NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision are government institutions, but they are STATE institutions. The libertarian in me can barely tolerate State funded universities, let alone Federal hegemony over their athletics. Don't even get me started on Title IX. If I could at all alter the Constitution, the Interstate Commerce Clause would be the second to be changed, right after the General Welfare clause. "I Should Have Been More Specific" should be inscribed on Madison's tombstone, but I digress.

There's my rant. I will probably take it easy on blogging for a bit longer. I just can't handle my disgust every time I hear the phrase "Team of Rivals" used to describe Barry's cabinet, and since there appears to be an FCC mandate that "journalists" use this phrase whenever speaking about the future administration, I'll probably be avoiding the news a bit longer, if only to avoid nausea and coronary disease. I hope to get back into it after the holidays, refreshed and ready for the inauguration/deification.

You Want To Make History? Let's Talk About History

Considering Constitutional scholar and Law Professor Barack Obama's regret over the restrictions placed on the government by the Constitution (a legal document) and its failure (or as I like to put it, "runaway success") to guarantee a right to your neighbor's property, I thought that maybe we should consider what the founders thought on the subject:

“When the people find that they can vote themselves money, that will herald the end of the republic.”
-Benjamin Franklin

I suppose that means the Republic has been on the down slope since the ratification of the 16th Amendment (which may not be legal). I guess Barry's going to make America great again by destroying the Republic and calling Ben Franklin an old fool.

“To take from one, because it is thought his own industry and that of his fathers has acquired too much, in order to spare to others, who, or whose fathers, have not exercised equal industry and skill, is to violate arbitrarily the first principle of association, the guarantee to everyone the free exercise of his industry and the fruits acquired by it.”
-Thomas Jefferson, letter to Joseph Milligan, April 6, 1816

So the author of the Declaration of Independence saw redistribution of wealth as a violation of every man's right to the fruits of his own labor. Oh well, what did he know about freedom and tyranny?

“A wise and frugal government … shall restrain men from injuring one another, shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government.”
-Thomas Jefferson, First Inaugural Address, March 4, 1801

So President Jefferson would see Barry Obama as unwise, unfrugal, and an advocate of "bad government". Remember though, Barry was President of the Harvard Law Review. He surely knows more about good government than Thomas Jefferson.

“Congress has not unlimited powers to provide for the general welfare, but only those specifically enumerated.”
-Thomas Jefferson

Not according to the Warren Court which wasn't that radical according to Barry.

“The moment the idea is admitted into society that property is not as sacred as the laws of God, and that there is not a force of law and public justice to protect it, anarchy and tyranny commence. If ‘Thou shalt not covet’ and ‘Thou shalt not steal’ were not commandments of Heaven, they must be made inviolable precepts in every society before it can be civilized or made free.”
-John Adams, A Defense of the Constitutions of Government of the United States of America, 1787

Harsh words for Barry from another Founding Father. Does Barry seek anarchy and tyranny? All he wants to do is render the legal document that defines the government of our union null, void, and meaningless. Its not like he launched his political career in the house of an avowed anarchist or anything like that.

“I cannot undertake to lay my finger on that article of the Constitution which granted a right to Congress of expending, on objects of benevolence, the money of their constituents.”
-James Madison, 4 Annals of congress 179 (1794)

Does that put "spreading the wealth" out of the question? What did Madison know anyway. He's only the Father of our Constitution.

“…[T]he government of the United States is a definite government, confined to specified objects. It is not like the state governments, whose powers are more general. Charity is no part of the legislative duty of the government.”
-James Madison

So whenever someone talks about America's duty to help out the less fortunate in America (those richer than only 90% of the rest of the world) it flies in the face of what James Madison believed the Federal government's purpose was when the Constitution was ratified? Surely they teach this at Harvar- . . . never mind.

“I am for doing good to the poor, but I differ in opinion of the means. I think the best way doing good to the poor, is not making them easy in poverty, but leading or driving them out of it.”
-Benjamin Franklin

So the best way to help a poor person is not to enable them in their poverty but to motivate them to pull themselves out of it? Well, if that were true, then how did poverty completely end after the Great Society programs?

“The Constitution only gives people the right to pursue happiness. You have to catch it yourself.”
-Benjamin Franklin

So happiness is not supposed to be benevolently bestowed upon us by the State? Huh, who knew?

I hate to say it Barry, but I think your "change" is the type of thing Ben Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, James Madison, and the Constitution specifically intended to stop. But what do they know? They were only the most famous of the greatest collection of men assembled at one place and time in History. You were President of the Harvard Law Review!

Read more quotes at Conservative Colloquium and The Reference Frame.

So That's What He Means

Finally, we know what Obama means by "change". Obama's own words from a Chicago Public radio interview in 2001:

"But, the Supreme Court never ventured into the issues of redistribution of wealth, and of more basic issues such as political and economic justice in society. To that extent, as radical as I think people try to characterize the Warren Court, it wasn’t that radical. It didn’t break free from the essential constraints that were placed by the founding fathers in the Constitution. . . (The Constitution) Says what the Federal government can’t do to you, but doesn’t say what the Federal government or State government must do on your behalf, and that hasn’t shifted. . . one of the. . .tragedies of the civil rights movement was, um, because the civil rights movement became so court focused I think there was a tendancy to lose track of the political and community organizing and activities on the ground that are able to put together the actual coalition of powers through which you bring about redistributive change."

Glad we cleared that up eight days before the election. Thank goodness there's still time for the media to apologize to everyone they labeled as "right wing lunatics" for conjecturing that Senator Obama may be a marxist. I'm sure all the big news organizations will lead with this revelation tonight.

Also, should (God forbid) Barry win the election, can we have him hooked up to a lie detector on inauguration day when he swears to "preserve, protect, and defend" the Constitution of the United States?

How Did I Miss This?

Terrific Walter Williams column from July 16th that brings to light new Oklahoma State legislations that seeks to reign in the overbearing and unconstitutional power of the Federal government.

Professor Williams, as bluntly as ever, puts it this way:

"One of the unappreciated casualties of the War of 1861, erroneously called a Civil War, was its contribution to the erosion of constitutional guarantees of state sovereignty. It settled the issue of secession, making it possible for the federal government to increasingly run roughshod over Ninth and 10th Amendment guarantees. A civil war, by the way, is a struggle where two or more parties try to take over the central government. Confederate President Jefferson Davis no more wanted to take over Washington, D.C., than George Washington wanted to take over London. Both wars are more properly described as wars of independence."

Wonderfully put. The slow erosion of our Constitution began with the War Between the States in 1861 and the States really no longer have any recourse to check the growing power of the Federal government. Professor Williams continues:

"Oklahomans are trying to recover some of their lost state sovereignty by House Joint Resolution 1089, introduced by State Rep. Charles Key.

"The resolution's language, in part, reads: "Whereas, the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States reads as follows: 'The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.'; and Whereas, the Tenth Amendment defines the total scope of federal power as being that specifically granted by the Constitution of the United States and no more; and whereas, the scope of power defined by the Tenth Amendment means that the federal government was created by the states specifically to be an agent of the states; and Whereas, today, in 2008, the states are demonstrably treated as agents of the federal government. 'Now, therefore, be it resolved by the House of Representatives and the Senate of the 2nd session of the 51st Oklahoma Legislature: that the State of Oklahoma hereby claims sovereignty under the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States over all powers not otherwise enumerated and granted to the federal government by the Constitution of the United States. That this serve as Notice and Demand to the federal government, as our agent, to cease and desist, effective immediately, mandates that are beyond the scope of these constitutionally delegated powers.'"

The Federal Government was created to be an advocate of the States, to provide for the common defense of the States, to represent the States to other nations diplomatically, and to regulate interstate and foreign commerce. These are powers specifically granted to the Federal government in the Constitution. All other rights, whatever they may be, are reserved to the States and the people by the 10th Amendment, which the Supreme Court conveniently forgot about during and after the War Between the States. Professor Williams goes on to quote James Madison in Federalist Paper 45, and Thomas Jefferson:

"The powers delegated … to the federal government are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State governments are numerous and indefinite. The former will be exercised principally on external objects, [such] as war, peace, negotiation, and foreign commerce. "The powers reserved to the several States will extend to all the objects which, in the ordinary course of affairs, concern the lives, liberties, and properties of the people." Thomas Jefferson emphasized that the states are not "subordinate" to the national government, but rather the two are "coordinate departments of one simple and integral whole. "The one is the domestic, the other the foreign branch of the same government."

The States were never envisioned as the provincial administrative units under the authority of the Federal government that they have become today. This is the essence of conservatism, to get back to the original intent of the Constitution, which was drafted to protect the liberty of the States, and thereby the lives, liberty, and property of the citizens.