6 posts tagged “lies”

As Americans take time this Memorial Day to remember those who have given what Lincoln called "the full measure of devotion" to protect our freedoms, here in Washington it is politics as usual - actually, it's even uglier than usual.

Congress this week found time to honor a college basketball team, Arnold Palmer, and Frank Sinatra…but then went home for a two-week vacation without funding American troops in combat, putting even the paychecks of our soldiers in jeopardy.

That's bad enough, now this video surfaces in which Rep. Paul Kanjorski, a leading congressional liberal, admits that Democrats lied to the public on the War in Iraq to win control of Congress.  You'll be outraged by what you see.

In response, Freedom's Watch is launching a telephone campaign to inform Americans about Congress' cynical and reckless dereliction of duty and how it's hurting our troops.  On our behalf, a veteran of the war in Afghanistan will be calling constituents all across the country telling them what their representatives are up to and asking them to deliver to Congress a simple message:  stop playing politics and support the troops!

COMMUNIQUE: 21 January 2008
Lights On, Nobody Home

The media leaves the false impression that Israel has completely cut Gaza's electricity.

David Barton

(First published in the October 2004 issue of The American Legion magazine)

The subject of constitutional interpretation may seem like a topic best fitted for an ivory-tower debate, but it actually has a very real and dramatic impact on daily life (as will be demonstrated shortly). In recent years, two competing viewpoints have emerged.

Probably the first exposure most citizens had to the two views came during the 2000 presidential debates. When asked what type of judges should be placed on the bench, candidate Bush responded: “I believe that the judges ought not to take the place of the legislative branch of government . . . and that they ought to look at the Constitution as sacred. . . . I don't believe in liberal, activist judges; I believe in strict constructionists.” ¹ Candidate Gore countered, “The Constitution ought to be interpreted as a document that grows.” ² Gore later stated, “I believe the Constitution is a living and breathing document. . . . We have interpreted our founding charter over the years, and found deeper meanings in it in light of the subsequent experience in American life.” ³ So, the two choices are . . . follow original intent, or construct a living constitution.

Proponents of a living constitution believe that we should not be bound by what dead white guys wrote two centuries ago when slavery was legal, women could not vote, and horses were the fastest means of transportation. Instead, we should live under a constitution that is alive and vibrant, reflecting today's values and beliefs.

Such rhetoric makes a living constitution sound appealing, but it is actually a complete misportrayal of the difference between the two philosophies. In reality, both accommodate an evolving society; in fact, under the strict construction (or originalist) viewpoint, Article V of the Constitution requires that the Constitution be a living document. The real difference between the two approaches is not whether the Constitution should evolve, but rather how those changes should occur - and who should make them.

Under the living constitution approach, history and precedent are largely irrelevant; instead, unelected judges create policy to reflect modern needs through the constitution they themselves write. As explained by Chief Justice Charles Evans Hughes:

We are under a constitution, but the constitution is what the judges say it is. ⁴

Ironically, under this modern approach, judicial policy-makers are regularly out of step with modern society. For example, although 80 percent of the nation currently opposes flag desecration, living constitution judges have ruled that the people are wrong on this issue and that the flag cannot be protected. Similarly, 90 percent of citizens in the federal Ninth Circuit supported keeping “under God” in the Pledge of Allegiance, but their living constitution judges pronounced them wrong.

Equally striking is the number of recent occasions in which living constitution judges have overturned statewide votes wherein the People clearly expressed their will (e.g., striking down votes in New York and Washington that banned physician-assisted suicides; in Arkansas and Washington that enacted term limits; in Missouri that rejected a tax increase; etc.).

Each of these popular votes would be valid under original intent because in that approach, the People — not unelected judges — determine their policies and values. And whenever the People want a change, they do not rely on a judge to make it; instead, they update their Constitution to reflect their views — as they have done on over two-dozen occasions. Samuel Adams pointed out the strength of this approach:

[T]he people alone have an incontestable, unalienable, and indefeasible right to institute government and to reform, alter, or totally change the same when their protection, safety, prosperity, and happiness require it. And the federal Constitution — according to the mode prescribed therein [Article V] - has already undergone such amendments in several parts of it as from experience has been judged necessary. ⁵ (emphasis added)

This unique American guiding principle made its appearance in the Declaration of Independence as “the consent of the governed.” The State constitutions penned after the Declaration reiterated this precept — as, for example, in Massachusetts in 1780:

All power residing originally in the people and being derived from them, the several magistrates and officers of government vested with authority — whether Legislative, Executive, or Judicial — are their substitutes and agents and are at all times accountable to them. ⁶

The same axiom was then established in the Constitution through the three-word phrase that begins its text: “We The People.”

Today's living document proponents decry this approach as majoritarianism - the so-called “tyranny of the majority.” Perhaps, but what is the alternative? Minoritarism? That a small group should be able to annul the will of the People and enforce its own desires upon the masses? Such an option is unacceptable under original intent. As explained by George Washington:

The fundamental principle of our Constitution . . . enjoins [requires] that the will of the majority shall prevail. ⁷

Thomas Jefferson agreed:

The will of the majority [is] the natural law of every society [and] is the only sure guardian of the rights of man. Perhaps even this may sometimes err. But its errors are honest, solitary and short-lived. ⁸

Does this original principle therefore mean that minorities are to be disregarded or trodden upon? Of course not. As Jefferson further explained:

Though the will of the majority is in all cases to prevail, that will to be rightful must be reasonable — the minority possess their equal rights which equal law must protect. ⁹

While the minority is not to prevail, with its constitutional guarantee of “free speech,” it does have the “equal right” to attempt to persuade the majority to its point of view. The minority does have equal rights, but equal right is not the same as equal power; the minority is never the equivalent of the majority and should never exercise control over it.

Living constitution judges, however, view the majority as inherently wicked and depraved — always seeking deliberately to violate the rights of the minority with only judges standing between the minority and total annihilation. Therefore, under this anti-majoritarian view, the greater the public support for a position, the more likely a living constitution judge is to strike it down.

Yet American history has proven that the best protector of minority rights is not the courts but rather the People. For example, former slaves received their constitutional rights not from the courts but by the majority consent of non-slaves; women were similarly accorded the constitutional right to vote not by the courts but by the majority approval of men; the constitutional rights accorded to the poor by the abolition of the poll tax came at the majority approval of those who were not poor; and the constitutional right allowing eighteen-year-olds to vote was given by the majority approval of voters not eighteen-years-old. Additionally, all of the constitutional protections for individuals and minorities established in the original Bill of Rights (e.g., speech, religion, petition, assembly, bearing of arms, etc.) were also enacted by majority consent. In other words, all minority rights in the Constitution have in all cases been established by majority consent.

In fact, the courts have a very poor record of protecting minority rights. Although living constitution proponents love to point to the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision that ended segregation as proof that the courts protects minority rights, they conveniently forget to tell the rest of the story. In 1875, Congress — by majority vote — banned racial segregation, but in 1882, the unelected Supreme Court struck down that anti-segregation law; in 1896, the Supreme Court reaffirmed its pro-segregation position; but in 1954, the Court finally reversed itself and struck down segregation - eighty years after “We The People” had abolished segregation.

It is not surprising that judges are fallible, for as Jefferson pointed out:

Our judges are as honest as other men, and not more so. They have — with others — the same passions for party, for power, and the privilege of their corps. . . . And their power the more dangerous as they are in office for life and not responsible — as the other functionaries are — to the elective control. ¹⁰

Certainly, the majority will sometimes err, but as Jefferson observed, “its errors are honest, solitary, and short-lived” and can be remedied by “elective control.” However, the errors created by judicial decisions are more severe and long-lasting.

While living document enthusiasts disparage strict constructionists as being narrow or restrictive, Justice Antonin Scalia counters:

Don't think the originalist interpretation constrains you. To the contrary, my [originalist] Constitution is a very flexible Constitution. You want a right to abortion? Create it the way all rights are created in a democracy: pass a law. The death penalty? Pass a law. That's flexibility. ¹¹

Scalia points out that it is just the opposite with living constitution judges:

They want the whole country to do it their way, from coast to coast. They want to drive one issue after another off the stage of political debate. ¹²

In short, then, the living constitution approach empowers an unaccountable elite to make decisions on behalf of the People; original intent empowers the People themselves.

[For more information on this topic please see David Barton's book Restraining Judicial Activism or his audio presentation Restraining Judicial Activism on cassette.]

Endnotes
1. Commission on Presidential Debates, "2000 Debate Transcript" (at http://www.debates.org/pages/trans2000a.html). (Return)
2. Commission on Presidential Debates, "2000 Debate Transcript" (at http://www.debates.org/pages/trans2000a.html). (Return)
3. PBS.org, "Online News Hour: Al Gore" (at http://www.pbs.org/newshour/election2000/candidates/gore_3-14c.html). (Return)
4. Charles Evans Hughes, The Autobiographical Notes of Charles Evans Hughes, David J. Danelski and Joseph S. Tulchin, editors (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1973), p. 144, speech at Elmira on May 3, 1907. (Return)
5. Samuel Adams, The Writings of Samuel Adams, Harry Alonzo Cushing, editor (New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1904), Vol. IV, p. 388, to the Legislature of Massachusetts on January 19, 1796. (Return)
6. A Constitution or Frame of Government Agreed Upon by the Delegates of the People of the State of Massachusetts-Bay (Boston: Benjamin Edes & Sons, 1780), p. 9, Massachusetts, 1780, Part I, Article V. (Return)
7. James D. Richardson, A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents, 1789-1897 (Published by Authority of Congress, 1899), Vol. I, p. 164, from the "Sixth Annual Address" of November 19, 1794. (Return)
8. Thomas Jefferson, The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, Julian P. Boyd, editor (NJ: Princeton University Press, 1961), Vol. XVI, p. 179, "Response to the Citizens of Albermarle," February 12, 1790. (Return)
9. James D. Richardson, A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents, 1789-1897 (Published by Authority of Congress, 1899), Vol. I, p. 322, from Jefferson's First Inaugural on March 11, 1801. (Return)
10. Thomas Jefferson, Writings of Thomas Jefferson, Albert Ellery Bergh, editor (Washington D. C.: Thomas Jefferson Memorial Association, 1904), Vol. XV, p. 277, to William Charles Jarvis on September 28, 1820. (Return)
11. About, "Scalia on the Constitution" (at http://usgovinfo.about.com/library/weekly/aa022701a.htm). (Return)
12. About, "Scalia on the Constitution" (at http://usgovinfo.about.com/library/weekly/aa022701a.htm). (Return)

By Jules Crittenden

Despite Hollywood’s best efforts, it just can’t get war right. Filmdom’s fiery-eyed zealots have never quite managed to fake the 1,000-yard stare.

The point has been underscored this week by “The War,” a documentary that for all its shortcomings has performed a great service, bringing to light previously unseen combat footage. That footage demonstrates what combat veterans and combat photographers know, but many filmmakers and ordinary Americans, innocent of that variety of carnal knowledge, do not appear to fully grasp. The most extraordinary things can be quite ordinary, the most unbelievable events playing out in matter-of-fact fashion. Without drama. Without irony. War, the stuff of the world’s greatest drama, is in fact very hard to film, as any combat cameraman can tell you. To do it effectively is to put yourself in a position where you very likely will be killed. To capture any of the drama you expect war to have, you have to capture the faces. And if you are successful, what you see then is often a void. An evocative, soul-chilling nothingness.

Hollywood’s longstanding failure to capture the reality of war is in part anchored in Hollywood’s tiresome, anti-American, multicultural agenda, but goes beyond that.

Hollywood came closest when it dispensed with moral lessons and just tried to be faithful to reality with docudrama “Band of Brothers,” safe territory deep in the heart of the Good War. A brief faithfulness to recorded reality that allowed Hollywood to explore the practical, ground-level execution and experience of war. Another rare departure from Hollywood’s typical moralism was “We Were Soldiers,” on the horrific battles of the Ia Drang in 1965, that attempts to understand the fighting spirit of professional soldiers. (Actual survivors of near massacres there consider themselves victors, tragically, deeply wounded though they were by their experience. They held their ground, giving better than they got. Despite their pain, the stuff of Hollywood epics, they understand the fundamentals of the execution of war.)

Hollywood’s moralistic monkey has climbed back up on its shoulder with “Flags of Our Fathers,” an attempt to tell the story of Iwo Jima without telling the story of Iwo Jima, paradoxically attempting to underscore the heroism of Iwo by pointing out how it was used for propaganda purposes, in effect diminishing the heroism and sacrifice of the Marines at Iwo by reducing it to a propaganda exercise. That was followed quickly by an odd exercise in political correctness, “Letters from Iwo Jima,” which through the eyes of that rarest of Japanese soldiers on Iwo … one that wanted to live … spins a tale of meaningless, futile sacrifice in war that, with its ennobling of the Japanese commander, paradoxically seeks meaning and exalts sacrifice in the futile effort to make futile sacrifice meaningful.

Now, Hollywood swan dives into the moralism tank with “In the Valley of Elah,” a movie that reportedly condemns the Iraq war by cherrypicking and embellishing a tragic tale without addressing any of the war’s fundamental issues, to convey the age-old message, “war is bad,” with its modern addendum, “and never worth it.” Disclosure: I haven’t seen this movie, and don’t intend to spend my money on it. The rave reviews told me all I needed to know. Forget self-defense, national security and the complexities of geopolitics in a dangerous world wherein dwell people that wish us ill. It is praised as a “Coming Home” for our time: War makes you crazy and kills people. These are the messages they choose to send in wartime, when our nation has soldiers in the field. Good luck. It’ll make you crazy. It’s never worth it. Your fanatical, suicidal enemy is human, too.

Meanwhile, the simple values, determination and sacrifice of soldiers who give their lives selflessly in defense of their nation … as well as the way in which the bloodlust that is a fundamental human trait can be channeled for noble purposes … gets bizarre, distorted comic book treatment in “300.”

Hollywood is in the fiction business, and has a bad irony addiction. Hollywood is, of course, the original drama queen. Hollywood remains on a quixotic crusade to belabor the obvious: war is bad, and any government that fails to use its words to resolve problems, evil. Hollywood fails to understand that war remains a necessary, ugly business and will be for the foreseeable future.

It may be that it is impossible for zealots with a drama jones to grasp the banality of extreme events, when they require them to be fraught with meaning, particularly when the filmmakers are today, almost without exception, uninitiated. It may also be impossible for actors to feign the subtle expression of faces of men in combat, intent on their business, or in the extreme, utterly expressionless, evocative of the void. You can’t fake those eyes.

As a technical matter, the combat footage of “The War” shows the emptiness of Hollywood’s best efforts, and directors should be forgiven if they give up on reality and honestly devote themselves to cartoons. It’s art, and where they succeed is when they fool people into thinking they have actually represented a reality. The reality can only ever be suggested, and fiction should never be mistaken for anything but a funhouse reflection. But filmmakers will try, doggedly and maybe sometimes admirably.

But here’s some advice to Hollywood. I know It’s too much to ask that you simply honor the sacrifices and the accomplishments without throwing in disparaging moral lessons, and anything that portrays what is happening now in a favorable light is out of the question. So perhaps you can attempt to tell the real stories of Iraq, World War II and Thermopylae, Vietnam and Korea honestly. You might look to the soldiers’ blogs and memoirs already emerging for your guide. Books by combat veterans and embeds, Nate Fick’s “One Bullet Away,” David Danelo’s “Blood Stripes,” and David Zucchhino’s “Thunder Run” can give you an unvarnished picture. “Generation Kill” is already taken, and we’ll see how they do. Blogs like Acute Politics, BadgersForward, Desert Flier and ADayinIraq will tell you what you need to know. You’ll find stories that will spare you the contrived “Private Ryan” or “Elah” plot devices.

Forget the drama and the labored, moral-shoving plot lines that actually have nothing to do with combat and everything to do with your politics. Focus on depicting something that approaches the reality, and its utter disregard for your moralism.

Read more from Jules Crittenden at Forward Movement