What we think of as the Revolutionary War may also be characterized as the commencement of The Great American Civil War. After a lengthy period of escalating disputes and tensions, British citizens in America revolted and resorted to warfare against the British king and other British citizens in Britain and America. Brother against brother; father against son; a civil war. As with all great conflicts, the causes were complex. But the emotional animus was the intrusive nature of the central government on individual rights and its disregard of the prerogatives of local governments.

In time the actual warfare came to an end and the colonies became independent, but the conflict regarding central versus local government and individual rights continued. Although some argued from the beginning for a strong national government, the distrust of strong central government produced an over-reaction in the Articles of Confederation. The states of America, having freed themselves of tyranny, had no appetite for submission to any central authority, with a weak confederation being the result.

Eventually, the ineffectiveness of the confederation and the practical needs of the nation brought the states and people to the Constitution of the United States. In the Constitution they ceded limited authority to the federal government, but nonetheless sufficient to bind the states into a unified nation. Nevertheless, the battle raged between the federalists and the republicans as to the proper balance between the central government and the states. The states not only reserved their traditional rights and powers as independent states, except as ceded in the Constitution, but also  demanded the immediate amendments in the Bill of Rights to assure that the natural rights of their citizens would be protected. Even though the federal government gained power, the distrust of the center remained strong.

The ratification of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights did not end the war. It continued to surface in different venues and issues such as the national bank and the role of the Supreme Court, occasionally with manifestations of civil unrest. The power of the federal government to restrict or end slavery in the states, however, eventually again brought the war between opposing concepts of national authority to a battle of arms. That the states were defending their right to enslave, when doing so was morally indefensible, muddies to this day the point that the Civil War resulted from a country  split on the constitutional roles, rights, and powers of the states and the federal government. The Civil War may have resolved by force of arms the battle over slavery, but it did no more than force below the surface the controversy over the proper role of the federal government. That aspect of the war did not end.

With the end of fighting in the Civil War, most citizens of the United States returned to a life where the government of the United States rarely had direct contact with them. Their state and local governments remained the primary forces in their lives. With the advent of the Progressive Movement toward the end of the 19th century, however, support grew for governmental intervention in society in ways previously unthinkable. Enthusiasm grew not only for dominance of the federal government over states, but also now for direct intervention in ways that impacted individuals. Social engineering by the governments, federal, state, and local, began to gain favor.

World War I brought the Progressive Movement into the federal government. The Depression, World War II, and the Cold War brought the ascendancy of the federal government as the dominant force in America. But the Great American Civil War continued. The entirety of the Twentieth Century was marked by the ebb and flow of the power of the federal government, such as the Reagan Revolution following the Great Society. The trend, however, has been unmistakably toward increasing action of the federal government in the lives of individuals and the diminishment of the role of the states as more frequently actors implementing federal directives than independent entities.

The passage of health care reform marks the latest battle in the Great American Civil War. It marked a completely partisan division regarding the most significant legislative change to the United States in almost a century. But we have not seen such a marked division regarding the role of the federal government since the conflict degenerated to a shooting war in the 19th century. We are a deeply divided nation regarding fundamental issues. History teaches that with such a clear divide in the  country we are in dangerous times.

Some states filed legal challenges as soon as the legislation was signed by President Obama to contest the constitutionality of the personal liberty intrusion of the individual insurance mandate and the infringement on states’ rights presented by the Medicaid mandates and special deals. Beneath the tip of that iceberg lies a multitude of issues that have frustrated and angered protaganists on all sides of the issues. The catalyzing issues may not be slavery, quartering of soldiers, or unjust taxation (ok the taxation theme is a constant), but the core of the contest follows a straight line back to the Revolution. Will we permit the central government to infringe our natural rights and arrogate power to itself that belongs to local governments?

Congressman Thaddeaus McCotter of Michigan succinctly summarized the division, and its seriousness, in a speech on the floor of the House of Representatives regarding the health care reform. He is worthwatching.

McCotter speaks eloquently to the transformation of the federal government in the eyes of Americans to the status of a ruler to be opposed. Substitute “King George” for “President Obama” and his speech could easily have been one delivered before the Continental Congress instead of just days ago in Washington.

Never in our history has the government of the United States attempted to force a citizen, under penalty of a fine, to purchase a good or service. The constitutional power to regulate commerce between the states simply cannot be so distorted to permit such a bald exercise of power over individuals. But if that is permitted to stand the war is over regarding individual liberty. If the government has the power to do that, then it can force us to do just about anything. It can tell us what cars to purchase, what food to eat, what books to purchase…..anything. And if it can fine us if we do not comply, then it can jail us also. The power to penalize is the issue. Once the power is affirmed, the nature of the penalty is only a question of degree.

The power of the federal government to force the states to expend money and act toward their citizens in ways they choose not to act is equally suspect constitutionally. Years ago I studied the Tenth Amendment and wrote a law review article regarding it. That the founders of our country did not intend the federal government to have such power is manifest. It is beyond historical dispute. The states, however, have for so long acquiesced in such an arrogation of power by the federal government as a matter of fact, contrary to the Tenth Amendment, that the actual strength of the concept of limted powers embraced within the amendment is now legally ambiguous.

So the battlefront in the Great American Civil War now turns to the courts and the ballot box in November and 2012. The courts, however, are themselves instruments of the federal government and have a long record of expanding the powers of the federal government far beyond the stated limitations of the Constitution, at the expense of states and individuals. There can be no confidence that they will not do so again. So citizens who value their freedom must be prepared to fight this battle at the ballot box and reverse this action. For if it stands, the war will be lost. For the power of the federal government will be without bounds.

A final word of warning. The news today is filled with hysteria regarding some acts of minor violence and threats toward representatives. Everywhere people of all political stripes condemn it as not characteristic of Americans. That is utter nonsense. We are a violent people who have had few reservations throughout our history of resorting to violence and warfare, domestically and internationally, in defense of our liberties. We are not Europeans with a history steeped in submission to authoritarian governments who surrendered meekly to democratic socialism. Individual liberty runs deep in the fiber of Americans.  To dismiss the potential of serious violence, from either side of the conflict, is foolish and historically ignorant.   The Great American Civil War has already produced two battles of arms and numerous incidences of civil unrest. We should not assume that it will end with a whimper if this battle in the courts and the polls ends in defeat for the opponents of central authority. This great conflict has resulted in violence before and it can happen again. That is the climax that I fear, but pray will not occur. History has not ended, however, and human nature has not changed. We must be vigilant.

The Greatest Generation also transformed American society in ways that now present a challenge to us, their children. Our parents sacrificed in ways great and small to assure that we would never have to do so. In the homes of our youth, most of us lived protected and sheltered lives where we never wanted for food, clothing, entertainment, transportation, education, and security. That we will have our wants and needs fulfilled has become a foundational expectation of our generation. The Greatest Generation not only saved our nation, but also birthed the entitlement society.

Our parents not only attempted to provide security to us in our homes, but also nationally through the construction of a massive “safety net” of entitlements. Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, food stamps, school lunches, education loans, and grants and subsidies of a broad variety became embedded as fixtures in our lives. The Greatest Generation had created such wealth that the nation seemingly could afford anything. Now that Babyboomers have come to leadership they focus on expanding those entitlements and creating new ones such as national health care. We have accepted government as a primary caregiver.

The entitlement society took root in Europe long before the flowering of social programs here. And the consequences of the concept of government as caregiver are bearing evil fruit there first also. Greece, burdened economically by increasing debt necessary to fund rich public jobs and entitlements, is on the verge of financial default. The citizens of Greece, however, addicted to the entitlement narcotic, have taken to the streets to fight any changes that might save them. They will sacrifice their country rather than accept modifications to their benefits. The descendants of the 300 who sacrificed their lives at Thermopylae to preserve Greece from the Persians will not sacrifice a euro to save their country. How sad!

The reality, however, is that the Babyboomer generation in America will face soon the same choice. Entitlements consume a greater portion of the Federal budget and our Gross Domestic Product each year. The entitlements that seemed affordable to our parents now exceed our capabilities. They are already not sustainable and if the health care entitlement passes our debt will be beyond any reasonable bounds. As the Babyboomers pass into senior status and consume more and more of these entitlements, we too will be beggared. Greece is our future unless we choose to change it.

Unlike the Greeks, we Babyboomers do not have to look back thousands of years for models of behaviors to guide us. We only have to look at the preceding generation. Our parents showed us the way. Yes, they laid the foundation of the entitlement society and gave us permission to live self-absorbed lives. But they also showed us that when America is in crisis, Americans have the courage and determination to make whatever sacrifices are necessary to preserve this nation. They showed us the no sacrifice is too great in the cause of liberty.

The unfortunate reality is that our nation simply cannot afford to fund the entitlement society for aging Babyboomers. The debt poses a threat to the existence of our nation as we know it. Yet the fear of the political consequences of confronting that reality trumps the economic reality in the minds of our political leaders.  They simply do not have the courage to keep us from hurtling down the same track as Greece. So it comes to us, the entitled, to make the difference. Unlike the citizens of Greece, rather than demand that we receive our due, no matter what the cost to our country, we must take the lead and concede that the entitlements must be reduced.

I’m not sure of the answer. Perhaps we must accept means testing so that only the truly needy receive the benefits. But I am certain that the time has now come for our generation to sacrifice to save our nation. We have been a generation of privilege that has sacrificed little for our country and taken much. As the primary beneficiaries of the entitlements, unless we are willing to sacrifice our “rights” to the benefits, nothing will happen. Our electoral strength is too great. The sacrifice demanded of us is not of the kind our parents made, but it is to surrender the security that our parents wanted to bequeath to us. The sacrifice that we must make is to take greater responsibility and risk for our lives in order that we might bequeath to our children an America that can be as great as that our parents left to us. Do we love our country enough to make that sacrifice? Are we made of the same stuff as our parents? Can we be Great?

I am a white male. I am an attorney and have practiced law as a trial attorney. I have served as a corporate executive in several major insurance companies. I now am President of a small consulting company. I live in an ex-urb, am married, and have two children and a dog. I attend church on Sunday and am an evangelical Christian. And perhaps my crowning achievement, I play golf and used to belong to a country club. 

If you are a member of the Democrat party, you may need to hear nothing more. You will proclaim, “Of course you are a Republican. You’re the quintessential country-club Republican.” You will draw that conclusion because you are a Democrat. You don’t care what people think. You decide who people are by the groups you can identify with them. You divide society into groups and ascribe importance to the groups, not the people. And you make assumptions by the labels you pin on people. You ironically claim to care about people, but would make no effort to know who I am because I wear the label “country club Republican.” 

But my story, and those of most Republican Conservatives, fit none of the stereotypes that Democrats advance. For I became a Republican before I was any of the things that I mentioned, with the exception of being a white male, an accurate label I unavoidably have carried since birth. So why am I a Republican? 

I was born to a working class family in the mountains of Western Maryland in 1953. My father had an eighth grade education and my mother made it to the ninth grade. Money was always tight in our household. We raised some of our food and I cannot recall a time when I did not have chores and work to do. My father was a World War II veteran, a worker in the local mill, union member, and, significantly, a committed and active Democrat. 

I was raised on politics. Political discourse was part and parcel of our family conversation. I remember clearly our support for John F. Kennedy and his near sainthood status after his death. Franklin Roosevelt was also venerated. In my youth I campaigned for Democrats without question. It was expected as a member of our family. 

But politics took a back seat to something even greater……our country. My father loved this country and taught me to have a deep and abiding respect for this nation. He made me understand what a great privilege it is to be an American and to never take for granted the sacrifices that so many have made so that I could have this privilege to live in this country. And the core of that privilege is that I am free. You hear it stated so frequently that ours is the greatest nation in the world. But all too often they are just words without meaning. In the household of my youth, however, that was doctrine written on our hearts by my father. And it was not sufficient to believe that doctrine. We also accepted that we had responsibility to preserve that freedom and pass it on to our children. That expectation was far greater than any expectation my father may have had with regard to our political affiliation. 

By the 1968 election I was confused politically. The Democrats seemed to embrace to some degree radicals who appeared to support enemies of our country. Yet the Republicans and Dick Nixon remained an anathema in our home. I turned 18 in 1971 during the height of the Vietnam War. I drew #8 in the draft and had to confront what I truly believed, for I had no deferment, but was eligible for a conscientious objector exemption because of the church to which I belonged. I concluded, however, that, as my father had taught me, I had an obligation to serve the cause of freedom. If I was not willing to serve my country when it called, whether or not I agreed with the reason for the call, then all freedom was jeopardized. Our obligation to country and freedom carried no qualifications. 

Concluding that I wanted to serve as an officer, I joined Army ROTC at my college rather than accept status as a conscientious objector, which was easily available to me without consequence. Doing so was not a popular thing. Only a small number of students were in ROTC. Some of the supposedly “tolerant” liberal students found it acceptable to throw food and spit at me when I wore the uniform. I will not pretend that I was not relieved when the draft ended and I did not have to go to Vietnam. Few rational people actually seek out war, but I had no expectation that I would not have to serve there when I joined. Through that experience, however, I gained a deeper respect for those who do serve and the sacrifices that they make so that others may be free to throw food and spit. 

By the election of 1972, I was in college by a combination of some support from my parents, scholarships, loans, and money I could earn. I was the first person in my family ever to go away to college. Those questions formed in 1968 about the commitments of Democrats to American values and individual freedoms were now in full bloom. I was now an historian and a political scientist and firmly entrenched in the reality that our freedoms are found not in the institutions of government, but rather in the Constitution and statutes that limit those institutions. So when it came time to register to vote, I became the first person in my family not only to go away to college, but also to register to vote as a Republican. I became a Republican, because I had become a Conservative….a Republican Conservative. Conservative by ideology; Republican by political necessity. 

I was not of the country club set. I was not a corporate executive. I was none of the labels. What I was, however, was a blue collar kid working my way through school with a profound love for my country and a deep appreciation for my freedom. I became a Republican because the Republican Party was the party of freedom — the freedom of the individual from intrusive government, the freedom to earn my way in the world wherever my talent and ambition could take me, and most important, the freedom of our values and democracy protected by our strength and extended wherever people sought to be free. 

Although there was little doubt in my choice, if there was any it vanished with the election of Ronald Reagan. Reagan essentially embodied my conception of what a President should be and articulated my feelings for our country and my conservative beliefs in the limited role of the federal government. So in explaining why I am a Republican Conservative, I shall use the words of President Reagan as my guide. 

“Concentrated power has always been the enemy of liberty.”

“Our natural, inalienable rights are now considered to be a dispensation from government, and freedom has never been so close to slipping from our grasp as it is at this moment.”

Reagan could have spoken those words today. The initiatives of Barack Obama, Harry Reid, and Nancy Pelosi are studded with efforts to arrogate greater power and control over our lives to the federal government, either by coercion or by forced dependence. I could cite example upon example, and I truly believe that the sum of it all demonstrates that our freedom is slipping from our grasp as Reagan predicted. But looking at a few examples rather than just a laundry list might be more helpful. 

Obama’s health plan is illustrative. In Orwellian fashion, he suggests that he is just expanding our choices. But what he actually proposes is a detailed government run health care system. Yes, theoretically choice will remain, but when employers must provide benefits that match the government plan or be fined, or when individuals must buy insurance or be fined, then as a practical matter we all are being forced to accept federally mandated health care and the choice is illusory. The simple fact is that if Barack Obama prevails he will force us all into a government-run, government-mandated health insurance program where a government bureaucrat decides what we need and when we get it. The power over our health care choices will have been concentrated in the hands of government. That concentration of power is, as Reagan said, an enemy of our liberty. 

Take then the so-called Obama tax cuts. In another wonderful example of Orwellian rhetoric, he asserts that he gave a tax cut for 95% of the country when only approximately 50% of those people pay taxes. Simply put, Obama takes money from some and baldly gives it to someone else. He candidly admitted during the campaign that his goal is “to spread the wealth around.” There is nothing clearer than when I ask the government to take from you to give to me, we both are made slaves of the government; you because the government has taken what is rightfully yours, and me because the government has replaced responsibility, accountability, and motivation with dependence. And I will become an addict ready to give the government anything for my next fix. I can think of nothing more invidious to our freedoms than to allow government to treat us as victims needing government services rather than citizens capable of managing our affairs and the affairs of our republic. What I want from government is to do that which we must do to protect and develop the country, within the structure of the Constitution, in ways that can only be accomplished by the combined citizenry. I want nothing from government for me as an individual. And I certainly want nothing that enhances me at the expense of your liberty. For if I agree to the compromise of your liberty, I most assuredly agree to the compromise of mine at the same time. 

My last example is a seemingly small one.  But liberty is rarely seized by broad sweeping revolutionary strokes. It frequently vanishes as leaves blown away before the wind. Each leaf makes little impact as it disappears, but when the tree is bare we will notice. Barack Obama, Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi, and a host of Democrats are behind efforts to eliminate the secret ballot in union elections. Think about that for a moment. There is little more critical to the machinery of our freedoms than the secret ballot. And they want to take it away. What possible good can come from that? How can eliminating election freedoms be consistent with the core values of our republic? And this is brought to us by the same people who have funded, supported, and, in the case of Obama, represented ACORN as it pursues a never ending campaign of electoral fraud that it admits and will not stop. If that is not, as Reagan said, our natural, inalienable rights being now considered as a dispensation from government, then I cannot imagine what could be. 

“We cannot play innocents abroad in a world that is not innocent.”

“History teaches us that wars begin when governments believe the price of aggression is cheap.”

There is no greater responsibility of government than to protect our freedom and values from destruction or infringement by enemies foreign or domestic. The commissioning oath of every military officer is “I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign or domestic, that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservations or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office upon which I am about to enter; So help me God.” The enlisted oath is similar. These young men and women pledge their lives in the cause of freedom. Our government has the concomitant responsibility to assure that those pledges are honored; that those lives are sent into harm’s way with a seriousness of purpose and a commitment to the preservation of freedom, either directly the freedoms of the citizens of the United States or others for whom we have the capability to extend freedom. 

I am a Republican Conservative because I see no seriousness of purpose regarding the protection or extension of freedom in the Democrats. They consider our soldiers, sailors, and Marines as victims and exalt those who complain. They seemingly have as great a concern for our enemies as our military, producing bizarrely restricted rules of engagement. They send them into overflights and missile drops, or into ground force policing actions, as symbolic demonstrations of will, but they loudly proclaim against using our military actually to fight in ways that they have been trained to serve and against actual enemies of our country. And President Obama naively believes that talk is a substitute for strength. He has reduced our military capabilities, and will do so in even more significant ways, proposes to eliminate our nuclear defense capabilities, and rarely speaks of how the military is a force for good. We live in a time where as Reagan said, governments from Russia to Iran to Venezuela perceive that the cost of aggression is cheap. I fear that the price is becoming even cheaper as they realize that President Obama is not a threat. Talk loudly but throw away our stick seems to be his plan. That will assure only that our military will get thrown into situations when they are long past desirable for the use of force and pay the price for such foolishness. 

My concern here is not academic or theoretical. My daughter is an ensign in the Navy and is now at flight school and will soon have her wings. When she joined ROTC, I asked her if she was prepared to sacrifice her life not in the cause of freedom, but for the folly of some politician. She told me that she recognized that risk, but she would follow her orders. She explained to me that some have to be prepared to fight, no matter the reason or cost, or there would be none to fight when freedom needed defense. As a father I am terrified that she may have to pay that price. I cannot control that. The folly of unfocused and ill-prepared military excursions certainly is bi-partisan. But it far more often flourishes in liberal weakness than the commitment to national defense that is bedrock conservatism. President Obama and liberal progressives encourage our enemies to regard the cost of aggression as cheap and make it more likely that our military will have to fight, but on far less favorable terms. That reason, even if I had no other, causes me to stand as a Republican Conservative. 

“Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn’t pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same.”

We live in a time of fear. Our economy is more fragile than we have ever known it to be in our lifetimes. Islamic totalitarianism and its terrorist handmaidens threaten us. Our society weakens from within by selfishness, by tolerance and acceptance of immorality, and by the fraying of the religious faith that once bound us tightly together. In such circumstances, the fearful all too frequently will mortgage their freedom for certainty, even if the certainty is metaphorically a cell, just as long as it is comfortable. History has taught that lesson time and time again. And it will teach us again if we do not stop it now. 

As I prepared this commentary, I researched quotes from Reagan on freedom. They were easy to find. Choosing those to use was the problem. I then I decided to use a few quotes from Barack Obama on freedom as a contrast. Perhaps the most disconcerting thing for me in this entire exercise was the result of my effort. I followed the same Google search with Obama that I did for Reagan: “Barack Obama freedom quotations.” Do your own search. I could find none of significance. Freedom comes up with his name in a meaningful way with regard to his support for the Freedom of Choice Act, which nullifies all restrictions of any type on abortion. Otherwise, he just has not discussed individual freedoms and liberties and the role of government in relation to liberty. 

When President Obama uses the word “freedom” it is incidental to another point rather than his focus. But he did say at a graduation address in the Spring of 2008 at Wesleyan University, “our individual salvation depends on collective salvation.”  That is chilling. Barack Obama makes no defense of individual liberty, but espouses subordinating the individual to the collective.  Can you imagine someone rising to the presidency of the United States without having made any worthwhile statement regarding individual liberty? America is not the shining city on the hill described by Reagan because it presents an opportunity for you to serve the state, but because of the individual liberties that it cherishes and protects. I am sorry, but President Obama is no friend of individual freedom.

I am not blinded to the fact that Republicans also have expanded the role of the government and limited our freedom in doing so. That is why I emphasize that I am a Conservative first. But I remain a Republican because in our electoral framework there simply is not a practical alternative. We must work to hold Republicans to conservative goals for government. For Conservatives to pursue ideological purity in another party may be intellectually admirable, but ineffective for the defense of liberty. The Republican Party certainly has been inadequate, but there are Republican Conservatives who need support and are growing in strength. For that reason, if you are a Conservative I encourage you to be a Republican Conservative. If you are not, as a practical matter you empower liberal progressives such as Obama, who unquestionably do not champion individual liberty. You must understand that risk. 

In closing, I again cannot do any better than to return to Ronald Reagan: 

“Let us be sure that those who come after us will say of us in our time, that in our time we did everything that could be done. We finished the race; we kept them free; we kept the faith.”

The advocates of government are in power, nationally and in the State of Maryland. The threats to freedom continue not only in the massive and obvious actions and proposals of Obama, Pelosi, and Reid, but also in all those small ways that are barely visible but nonetheless steal our liberty. We Conservatives must join and fight against the never ending encroachments of government. We cannot let tests for 100% purity in conservative thought to split us and diminish our electoral impact. As Marco Rubio, Florida Senate candidate said before Conservative Political Action Conference on February 18, the election of 2010 is “not a simple choice between liberals and conservatives. It will be a referendum on our nation’s very identity.” We must succeed now at the ballot box to defend and preserve freedom. Successful defense of liberty will come only in a long series of small victories on legislation, regulations, and elections at the local, state, and federal levels. It will come through a great deal of thankless work with little glory. But it is our obligation to those who sacrificed to hand us the freedom we have. If we do, we can say, as Reagan, that to those who come after us, “we kept them free; we kept the faith.”

Armstrong also took the flag of the United States to the moon. The exploration of space and landing on the moon symbolized American greatness. As Americans, we could accomplish that which others could barely imagine. Americans do the impossible.

“Space, The Final Frontier” were the first words at the opening of the 60s television show “Star Trek” that has become iconic. Many of us who measured our lives with the US space program embraced the Star Trek series passionately. It envisioned a day when all humans were engaged in the common mission of space exploration. It gave life to those dreams that took flight with the rockets. But the series also clearly grasped the pioneering spirit that made America great and just extended it into space. Captain James T. Kirk embodied the spirit of America. Kirk let nothing stand in his way. He was a conquerer and pioneer and brought liberty in his path. In the American space program, that unique spirit that brought the first travelers to our shores and carried the leather-clad adventurers over mountain after mountain until Americans stood on the shores of the Pacific, continued on.

President Obama now plans to terminate our exploration of space. He does not state it in those terms, but in ending the Constellation program, he will have eliminated our ability to put Americans in space. The Constellation program has been developing the next generation of space vehicles to replace the Space Shuttle, which will be retired by the end of this year. Without the vehicles to carry Americans into space, we will become dependent upon Russians, Chinese, or perhaps Indians to provide space transportation for American astronauts. Moreover, the mission of NASA will be redirected from exploration of space to the substantiation of climate change theories on Earth.

President Obama’s withdrawal of America from independent space exploration is emblematic of everything wrong with this administration. He reduces us from the nation held in awe by the rest of the world as we conquered the moon to a hitchhiker metaphorically at the corner with our thumb out begging for a ride. He decries our exceptionalism and seems to be doing all that he can to establish that we are no longer great. He apologizes, bows, and constantly diminshes our country. Throughout my entire life I have believed that, as Americans, we could accomplish everything. I held to that faith because, no matter what we faced, I knew that we could conquer it because we conquered space. In so many ways, Barack Obama, the “Hope President”, has been instead a president of disillusion. But in canceling the Constellation, he has done the unforgivable. He has lost the Final Frontier.  In so doing, he cuts from our national soul a significant part of that spirit that defines America. He truly has gone where no president has gone before. He makes us common and small.

I do not want to get involved in a dissection of the words that Reid used or the meaning. It is quite possible that they are a window into his soul and reflect a closet racist exposed. But on the hand, they might not be. They might just have been an unfortunate choice of phrasing. Frankly, I don’t care.

What is happening now regarding Reid’s statement demonstrates one of the worst characteristics of the instant media world in which we live and the pettiness of our political society. As a Republican, I want our leaders to rise above rather than wallow in this mire. And the fact that the Democrats have played the game of personal and political assassination over similar situations, such as the comments by Trent Lott regarding Strom Thurmond, do not justify doing so now. As my Mama used to say, “Just because the other kids are jumping off the bridge doesn’t mean you should too.”

The measure of a person used to  be what that person does. Character was measured by behavior. Yes, occasionally a person can say something so reprehensible, so beyond the pale, that the statement is unforgiveable. But who among us does not from time-to-time say the insensitive, the politically incorrect, or the socially uncomfortable? I know I am thankful that I do not have people tracking my every word as I live with my foot in my mouth! As Jesus Christ so wisely advised, let those among us who are without sin cast the first stone.

Unfortunately, today statements of public figures are too often immediately magnified, stretched, parsed, and distorted beyond all meaning to serve agenda unrelated to the intent of the statement. In the saturated media environment in which we live, I submit that the only difference between the politician who hits the headlines over a statement and one who does not are only the standards of the recipient of the communication, not the speaker.

There still are reporters who can qualitatively evaluate the merits of a statement, put it in context, and realize that the world may best served by letting it go. But not most. All too many are just interested in posting a headline.  And the broadest and most important context is whether the statement matches the trend of the person’s behavior and life. And in that context can you really say that Harry Reid has the track record of a racist?

I happen to believe that we are facing one of the gravest political crises of our republic and our liberties are at great risk. And I also happen to believe that Harry Reid, along with Nancy Pelosi and Barack Obama, is at the forefront of those who put our liberty in jeopardy. But our political discourse is not served by unseriousness. We all, whether liberal, conservative, independent, apolitical, or whatever, must stop engaging in nonsense. We have to stop crucifying people, no matter how satisying it might be, for the occasional thoughtless statement. We just have to be more serious about serious things, and less so about the rest.

I watch how Harry Reid behaves  as the Majority Leader of the Senate and judge that he is not worthy of the office and needs to go. He is an opponent of liberty. I want him to resign or lose the election because he is unfit to lead. But his record of behavior is not as a racist and I shall not judge him to be so for political expediency.

The mandate raises a critical question: Where does the federal government have the authority to force anyone to purchase a good or service? Ruth Marcus of the Washington Post today casually dismisses this constitutional liberty grounded in limited government. She relies upon the Commerce Clause and the government’s ancillary authority to tax. If she is correct, the health care legislation will not only stand as the Waterloo for the fiscal integrity of the United States, but also the death knell for the last threads of limited government and individual liberty.

I confess to being a strict constructionist  insofar as constitutional interpretation is concerned. There is no doubt in my mind that the Commerce Clause was intended for the limited purpose of preventing one state from erecting barriers to trade originating in another state. Unfortunately, that has become little more than an interesting historical discussion. Marcus is correct that Supreme Court precedent, especially since the Depression, has expanded federal regulatory authority in many ways utilizing the Commerce Clause as the door. Where she is wrong, however, is extrapolating from these precedents addressing the authority of government to regulate  commercial behavior the new authority to force commercial behavior.

Marcus pays lip service to this distinction. She writes:

Granted, there is a difference between regulating an activity that an individual chooses to engage in and requiring an individual to purchase a good or service. Granted, too, there is a difference between making automobile insurance compulsory, as a condition of the privilege to drive a car, and making health insurance compulsory, whether an individual wants it or not.

But she justs goes on to presume that the distinction is meaningless and encompassed within current precedent.

There is a maxim in judicial interpretation that the law follows the facts. The truth is that the Supreme Court has never been presented with a case under either the Commerce Clause or authority to tax that involves the government forcing an individual to purchase a good or service rather than restricting commercial behavior that can be considered detrimental to interstate commerce. If Marcus is nevertheless correct, there is no limit to what we can be forced to do. Would it not be in the interest of a healthy interstate economy to prevent the demise of General Motors? Force us to buy GM cars! Isn’t AIG too big to fail? Force us to buy AIG insurance! Want to promote the beef industry? Force vegetarians to eat meat! And on and on it will go.

The health legislation is a cornucopia of progressive usurpation of our rights. I consider the mandate, however, to be the most pernicious. So much of the discussion and attacks by conservatives have focused on the public option. I’m concerned, however, that when the public option dies the mandate will ride in on the tide.

UPDATE: Looks Like the Heritage Foundation Agrees….

A mandate requiring all individuals to purchase health insurance would be an unprecedented form of federal action. The government has never required people to buy any good or service as a condition of lawful residence in the United States. An individual mandate would have two features that, in combination, would make it unique. First, it would impose a duty on individuals as members of society. Second, it would require people to purchase a specific service that would be heavily regulated by the federal government.

Read the entire analysis

Much has been written about how much the Obama administration is trying to do and the multitude of ways in which the President is transforming our society. As a political junkie, I try to read as much as I can and follow closely what is happening. But I’m on overload!

Just trying to understand what is going on with the thousands of pages of proposed health care legislation in the House and Senate is more than I can handle. So, I decide to write about that. But when I do, I find out that the proposed Copenhagen climate change treaty will include a wholesale sell-out of national sovereignty. Well, that’s important, so perhaps I should write about that instead. But wait, The Obama administration reversed long standing policy and joined the ironically-named UN Human Rights Council and immediately supported free speech restrictions. Wow! That’s very singificant! I’ll write about that. But the Senate has just confirmed David Michaels to lead OSHA and he has stated that he intends to use OSHA to implement broad gun control regulations. He’s going to be a real problem, so that’s where I’ll focus.

So do you see my problem? I feel like I’m trying to watch ten tennis matches at once. I just cannot keep track of them and feel overwhelmed. Do you feel the same? What really troubles me is that I’m afraid that we are living in a giant game of Three card Monte. While we’re trying to follow the health care money card we cannot follow  how we are really losing our freedoms in so many other ways. I hope I’m the only one overcome with political attention deficit disorder, but I fear that we are eventually going to find that the government has built walls around us while we were not paying attention.

When the “justice” enforced is popular within the community, and the community accepts the act of the vigilante, the very civil fabric is at risk. When we give ourselves over to vigilantes we surrender to lawlessness and in so doing we put all freedom at risk. For the law is the only protection of freedom outside of countervailing force. 

What we are witnessing in the actions by the Obama administration to cut the pay of corporate executives is nothing more than vigilante justice. Whether or not they are individually responsible for the failure of their companies or our financial system, the compensation and behavior of these executives is generally indefensible. They have few defenders and are easy and popular targets. Some have been forced to take dramatic cuts in pay and more cuts will follow. And sadly, the community cheers this vigilante action across the political spectrum….from Bill O’Reilly  to The Huffington Post.

This is vigilante justice because we do not ask, “Where is the law in this?” The oft cited rationale is that because the firms received TARP money the government can enforce these pay cuts. But that is not an act of law, but simply naked force. The government has the financial power so it can do this.  The government is either a majority or minority shareholder in most of these firms, but it has not acted as a shareholder petitioning the board of directors for action to change executive compensation. It has not gone to court to invalidate the contract rights of the executives, although whether it would even have the legal standing to do so is questionable. It has not acted criminally against the executives and sought the recovery of ill-gotten gains, presumably because it knows it cannot. And it did not provide the government funding through TARP with the conditional right for compensation limitations. Whatever appearance of legitimacy surrounds this act comes from self-declared authority after the funding was done. 

Simply stated, the administration has capability to force these changes, but doing so is not just. The subjects are villainous and the action popular, but even villains and the unpopular are entitled to protection. We should stop and think about the implications of our actions, for we are all complicit when we do not oppose such force. The truth is that vigilantes are not enamored with justice, but rather power. Those that cheer one day, can easily be the target the next day. When the government acts in such a heavy handed way, no matter how popular, we all lose. The preservation of individual liberty sometimes requires us to hold our nose at the offense of another, at least until the offense is redressed within the law. That we celebrate now may indeed cause us to lament in the future.

Another Memorial Day weekend will soon be upon us. A three day weekend. Time to relax; maybe have a cookout; perhaps catch the first summer movie releases. I’m planning to play golf. Unfortunately, for too many of us, Memorial Day has become just another three day holiday for fun and games. But it used to be different. 

Memorial Day originally was called Decoration Day.  It always has been a day of remembrance for those who have died in our nation’s military service. Over two dozen cities and towns lay claim to being the birthplace of Memorial Day to remember those who died in the Civil War. There is also evidence that organized women’s groups in the South were decorating graves even before the end of the Civil War. Wherever it started, Memorial Day was officially proclaimed on May 5, 1868 by General John Logan, national commander of the Grand Army of the Republic. It was first officially observed by the country on May 30, 1868, when flowers were placed on the graves of Union and Confederate soldiers at Arlington National Cemetery. 

When I was growing up in a small town in Western Maryland, the focus was still essentially that: honoring those who sacrificed their lives for the country. Memorial Day occurred on May 30 then. No matter what day of the week that was. In the days leading up to the holiday, I used to work in the local cemetery carrying water for flowers and helping families decorate the graves of loved ones. The day was a school holiday, but it involved a parade to the cemetery where speeches of remembrance were given.  The turn-out from the community was usually pretty good. I also remember that buying paper poppies to demonstrate respect for the veterans, living and dead, was something that was very important to my father, a World War II Navy veteran. So we all wore poppies on Memorial Day. 

My guess is that many of you here remember similar Memorial Day ceremonies and observances.  But you know, it struck me the other day that I cannot recall the last time I saw anyone selling poppies. Perhaps the tradition lives on, but if it has somewhere along the way it has lost its prominence.  It seems to have just slipped away, at least from me. 

And, like the poppies,  sometime along the way since my earlier years, perhaps when Congress made the day part of a three day weekend, the remembrance and honoring of those lost in our wars seems to have become an ancillary part of just another weekend of recreation, shopping, and eating. In a sense I hope that is the explanation, which is bad enough, but I fear there may be even more at work than that. I fear that we are becoming a society that takes for granted the sacrifices that are the heart of Memorial Day.  Moreover, I fear even more that many Christians have come to regard that the only proper service for Christians is in opposition to war, rather than the sacrifice of military service. But when we no longer see the goals of military service as honorable, it is difficult to honor those who sacrifice themselves in that service. 

As I speak, my wife and I are awaiting confirmation that our 19-year-old daughter has arrived safely in the Persian Gulf on board the newest aircraft carrier in the fleet, the USS Ronald Reagan. She is a second class ROTC Navy midshipman and has been assigned to the Reagan for her summer cruise. She hopes to be a naval aviator, so her first tailhook landing will be a great thrill for her and a great anxiety for me and her mother. Even though the Reagan is on duty supporting war operations in Iraq, our daughter is not exactly an active duty warrior in harm’s way, but her mother and I will feel better when she returns home.

Although our daughter and the other midshipmen in her unit are just normal college kids, you can sense in them that they understand and have accepted the sacrifices that they may have to make for our country. When they put on their uniforms they also put on a seriousness of purpose that you don’t see in others their age. They seem to instantly mature. They understand sacrifice. Indeed, one grasped it so well, that he left school this year to join Marines going to Iraq. He did not feel that he should remain behind when men he knew were going into harm’s way. 

What is interesting is the perspective some people have had about our daughter’s service. She is openly and unabashedly Christian. Yet she wants to fly and, if required, is perfectly at peace with dropping ordnance on terrorists. Some have directly questioned, however, how she could be a Christian, yet want to be a warrior. One of our neighbors, for example, who is a person of faith, questioned me one evening as to how we could support her service. She indicated that she did not see how a person could be a Christian and in the military. I cannot grasp that position though, for to me it seems the consummate expression of devotion to God and country. 

I know that in some circles it has become politically incorrect to make such a statement. To such people the concept of “for God and country” has become an anachronism. I cannot accept, however, that a Christian willing to sacrifice his or her life to preserve our freedom, or bring freedom to others, is a contradiction with our faith. 

Sacrifice is, indeed, the touchstone of our faith. Our very salvation rests on the sacrifice of Christ for our sin. And he calls us to service and sacrifice. Christians have answered calls to serve by bringing fundamental needs of food, medical care, and education to those in need around the world, and have put their lives at risk to do so. Such service unquestionably stands as honorable Christian service. Freedom and security are no less fundamental needs. To fight those who kill, imprison, and oppress is no less honorable. And those who give their lives doing so must never be taken for granted and must be remembered and honored by us. 

Paul charges us in Galatians 5: 1:

For freedom Christ has set us free. Stand firm, therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery.

Christ purchased our freedom from sin with his life and Paul challenges us to never turn our backs on that sacrifice. Those we honor today purchased our freedom from tyranny and oppression with their lives. We also must never turn our backs on them nor the cause of freedom for which they paid that price. 

Unfortunately, we again live in a time when people want to deprive us of our lives, freedom, and faith. Just this week I read that Iran may make Jews wear yellow cloth patches just as in Nazi Germany. They also may make Christians wear red patches. Our freedom and security are being threatened in ways we have not seen before and could not have imagined just five years ago. And today men and women are again paying freedom’s price in Iraq, in Afghanistan, and in unknown engagements with terrorists around the world. Honoring those sacrifices with our words today is not enough. As Paul charges us, we must “stand firm” in the cause of freedom. We must assure that those who have sacrificed themselves will not have done so in vain. 

So we gather here today. As the Israelites crossed the Jordan, they built their monument of stones to help them remember God’s gift to them as they entered into the Promised Land. So let us commit to build monuments in our hearts that will help us remember the gift of freedom that men and women have given to us, and are still giving to us, at the price of their lives. Let us never forget that each moment of freedom we enjoy was purchased for us by the sacrifices of our military men, women, and families. Let us never forget.

© 2006, Thomas M. Trezise