Cheney’s recent speech reminded me of a famous one by Barry Goldwater – “I would remind you that extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice. And let me remind you also that moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue.” Americans rejected it soundly then and my hope is that they will reject it again. If we give up the principles that have defined us as a society based on the rule of law and justice for all, then we are little better than the terrorists who would attack us. If we accept Nixon’s formulation that “if the president does it it is not against the law” we will have abandoned the rule of law for that of expediency and will quickly become subjects of the government. The government of, by and for the people will indeed perish from the earth. If we live in fear of fear itself we will become easy prey for the despots who chafe under that rule of law and resort to fear mongering. The blood of patriots was not shed so that future generations could give away the essence of the Republic in exchange for a handful of hollow words about keeping us safe. We owe it to them to live up to the principles that they fought to protect.
— Chief
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June 25th, 2009 at 10:32 am
Hello Mr Smith:
Our government has become a bit ugly in the manner by which it no longer seems to find it necessary to hide alliances with third party masters who make all of the high level decisions outside the perview of the electing public. (A trillion dollar bank bonanza being the latest example)
I have given thought to the idea that one impediment working against our ability to follow the spirit of Franklin’s post convention posit, “We have a republic, if we can keep it.” is the small number of representatives who occupy seats in our government, as the chicanery of collusion is aided by smaller groups.
Unfortunately, our no-longer-free press does not comprise a small group, and has nonetheless been co-opted with magnificent success by (naturally) the same third party “masters”.
If he were alive today, I don’t think Mr. Franklin would be very happy about our lot.
– Ron