Many people hear all of the ranting from those of us who are libertarians and they just hear politics. When you mention Barak Obama in a negative way they figure you are either trying to win the next election for your side or you are a racist. Not everybody, but a lot of people.
I do not agree with Barak Obama's basic philosophies. He and I do not share core values. I admit I think he loves his kids and wife and doesn't believe in rape or murder or stealing, but I am talking about his philosophies on government and society.
The folks who founded our nation took the time to carefully read all of the great philosophers that came before them, and then they discussed and debated and disagreed, and finally put together a set of principles. Those principles became the Declaration of Independence and Constitution and Bill of Rights, and all of the great supporting documents like the Federalist Papers that explained what they wanted this country to be.
They forsaw a country built on a set of principles that was pretty unique in human history. No king, no dictator, just free people going about their business, pursuing happiness without government dictating their every move. They came from a place, and broke away from a King, who wanted to do just that. The Monarch didd not like the colonists going about their business and not paying his taxes and doing what he said.
Communism and socialism are legitimate concepts, advanced by Marx and others, but these are not the concepts upon which this country was founded. Hitler actually espoused fascism, and thought it would work well, so long as he was in control. But we do not embrace fascism.
The United States was founded on the concept of limited government. It is the bedrock of who we are. They went to great lengths to specify that the power of the federal government was to be limited, and spread out among three branches so that power would be diluted. Yes, they feared Tyranny because they had experienced it. They launched the Great Experiment, one where Democracy, Free Market Capitalism, Individual Liberty, and Limited Government were the cornerstones.
Some people don't like the system they set up. Some people would like to live in a socialist, or fascist, or even a communist system. And some people are not happy that our constitution is a document of "negative liberties", that is, the constitution tells the government what it CANNOT do. Congress shall make no law resistricting our rights to free speech, free press, etc. Some people feel that this was a big error in judgement on the part of the founders.
Who, you ask? Barak Obama, who is an "expert" on constitutional law. From an interview;
OBAMA: If you look at the victories and failures of the civil rights movement and its litigation strategy in the court, I think where it succeeded was to vest formal rights in previously dispossessed peoples. So that I would now have the right to vote, I would now be able to sit at the lunch counter and order and as long as I could pay for it I’d be okay. But the Supreme Court never ventured into the issues of redistribution of wealth and sort of more basic issues of political and economic justice in this society. And to that extent as radical as people tried 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, at least as it’s been interpreted, and the Warren court interpreted it in the same way that generally the Constitution is a charter of negative liberties. It says what the states can’t do to you, it says what the federal government can’t do to you, but it doesn’t say what the federal government or the state government must do on your behalf. And that hasn’t shifted. One of the I think tragedies of the civil rights movement was because the civil rights movement became so court focused, I think that there was a tendency to lose track of the political and community organizing and activities on the ground that are able to put together the actual coalitions of power through which you bring about redistributed change and in some ways we still suffer from that.
So, yes, we disagree on core principles, and I want his ideas on redistribution of wealth to fail. I am one of the people who see Tyranny lurking around every corner. And I will point to the recent scandals as proof that this administration wants more power and does not see the Bill of Rights the same way as you or I do. The Affordable Care Act is a massive expansion of government power.
I think the founders would be horrified, and tea would be going into the harbor.
Listen to the interview here.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2jr9mLB3yKs
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