Today's Politicos vs The Words and Deeds of The Founders

Two stories in the news last week are a reminder that the left is like the Energizer bunny: It just keeps on keeping on.

The IRS and Department of Justice scandals rocking the Obama administration make this a timely review. They demonstrate the consequences of Unlearning Liberty.

The author is a First Amendment lawyer and president of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE), an organization dedicated to defending free speech rights on college and university campuses. FIRE is politically ecumenical, encompassing conservatives, liberals and libertarian free speech warriors. It goes to war and to court to defend students’ and faculties’ First Amendment rights at institutions of higher education.

Logan Beirne has written a book that connects the past with the present. It is a historical review of how George Washington conducted himself during the American Revolution and set precedents which all subsequent Presidents have felt the weight of, whether or not they chose to be guided by them. Fortunately for the people of the United States, most Presidents since Washington’s time have seen fit to conform to the outline of the role shaped by the Father of our country – at least to some degree.

Reader discretion advised, book contains explicit content of a disturbing nature.

This little book does not carry a warning label, but it should. It’s diminutive 5” x 7” format and 43 pages of large print belie the universe of disturbing information within. Martin previously reviewed another book in the excellent Encounter series. This one is Broadside 28.

Author Eric Metaxas has written an unusual book. It is part biography, part history, and part philosophy. Ostensibly it is primarily the former more than the latter. However, it is much more than just the story of one remarkable man’s life. It is the story of choices and consequences. It is a depiction of brutal honesty and what it really means to stand for something.

On Wednesday Eric Holder testified before Congress about the Justice Department’s wiretapping of Associated Press reporters’ phones. I’m not sure “testify” is the proper term. Holder showed up, didn’t say anything for four hours and called it a day. He has recused himself from any further involvement in the whole wiretapping business. Not that he actually has that whole recusing business in writing or anything, or if he does, the document is in the same place his Fast and Furious records are kept. And those are locked up tighter than the maker of that crummy Islamic video. This from “The Most Transparent Administration in History.” Yes, as transparent as a milkshake.

It was bound to happen. Progressives, an appellation the president embraces, believe that the Constitution is an outdated encumbrance to the necessary exercise of power. Officials who do not respect the rule of law are free to do whatever they perceive as necessary in a given situation. This time that involved, in the words of Steven Aftergood, a government secrecy expert at the Federation of American Scientists, “an astonishing assault on the core values of our society.”

As adequately demonstrated throughout history, impinging on individual freedoms for the common good eventually requires the use of force. But it’s not necessary to look to history. In Germany homeschooling is verboten and violating that dictat can result in forcible removal of children and jailing of parents.

This book is part biography and part social and political history. Quitt draws on previously untapped sources to try to do justice to a complex man now little more than a footnote to history. The irony is that, in his time, Douglas was widely admired and thought much more likely to ascend to the presidency than the man whose election relegated him to the shadows. If Douglas is remembered at all, it is for debating Lincoln in 1858 when Lincoln ran for Douglas’s Senate seat.

Where, oh where to begin on Benghazi? Let’s start with Jay Carney. During his recent performances at White House press briefings he appears to be doing the political version of Stop, Drop and Roll. I used to think Jay Carney was a reasonably intelligent man. Not that I ever much agreed with him, but I didn’t picture him as a dunce. Now it’s hard to consider him as much else. Why do I say this? Just ask him. Nearly every question posed to him by the White House press corps (alternatively known as the White House “steno pool”) are met with responses like “I dunno”, I have no knowledge”, “We’ll look into that”, and, of course, “Huh?”