Posted on 03/25/2015 8:30:48 AM PDT by Kaslin
It’s not enough to propose liberal ideas. Eventually, you must use force against your fellow citizens if they don’t embrace them. Coercion is at the heart of the liberal enterprise.
Hence, President Obama has unveiled his latest plan to fundamentally transform the United States – mandatory voting. It comes on the heels of his unconstitutional order granting legal status to five million illegal immigrants. Coincidence?
Ironically, it also landed the very same day that Hillary Clinton floated the idea that summer camps should be created for adults because we have a “fun deficit.” Perhaps they will get together and create Camp Chicago, where “fun” activities include voting early and often.
To bolster his case, Mr. Obama noted at the town hall in Cleveland on Wednesday that, “Other countries have mandatory voting.”
Most other countries have voter ID laws too, but that doesn't fit the narrative.
“It would be transformative if everybody voted – that would counteract money more than anything,” Mr. Obama said. This is the man who shunned matching funds as hundreds of millions of dollars poured into his campaign, some of it anonymously from out of the country.
He also continued hawking the Saul Alinsky-inspired line that Democrats care deeply about the economic welfare of middle-class Americans. Well, sure they do. Like a glutton loves his lunch. Democrats need to keep the middle class barely solvent so they can pluck them like chickens and redistribute the booty to their constituents.
Faced with widespread negative reaction, White House spokesman Josh Earnest yanked back Mr. Obama‘s trial balloon a day later, saying it was not a “specific policy prescription for the United States.”
America’s founders abhorred the idea of universal democracy, which is why they fashioned a constitutional republic with separation of powers between the states and the central government and within the national government. Plus, national borders and meaningful citizenship.
In Federalist 10, James Madison warned of the dangers of a pure democracy without republican safeguards:
“[S]uch democracies have ever been spectacles of turbulence and contention; have ever been found incompatible with personal security, or the rights of property; and have, in general, been as short in their lives, as they have been violent in their deaths.”
In 1787, Madison foresaw the temptations to which liberal utopians would succumb:
“Theoretic politicians … have erroneously supposed, that, by reducing mankind to a perfect equality in their political rights, they would, at the same time, be perfectly equalized and assimilated in their possessions, their opinions, and their passions.” One size fits all. Sounds like Obamacare, doesn’t it?
This is why Mr. Obama wants the voter base universalized. The plan would ensure that hardworking, taxpaying citizens who bother to register to vote have no more say in what they keep of their own earnings than people who use the government as a knee-breaking goon to “spread the wealth.”
In his short masterpiece The Law (1850), Frederic Bastiat described the immoral reality that Mr. Obama wants to unleash on the rest of us via “pure” democracy: “Sometimes the law defends plunder and participates in it.... if the law benefits one citizen at the expense of another by doing what the citizen himself cannot do without committing a crime.”
Mr. Obama laments that, “The people who tend not to vote are young, they're lower income, they're skewed more heavily towards immigrant groups and minority groups. There's a reason why some folks try to keep them away from the polls.” Race card, anyone?
CNN helpfully notes that, “less than 37% of eligible voters actually voted in the 2014 midterm elections, according to The Pew Charitable Trusts. That means about 144 million Americans -- more than the population of Russia – skipped out.”
But, wait. It’s not the delinquent voters’ fault. It might not even be that they weren’t thrilled by the choices presented to them by the two major parties. The real culprits in suppressing the minority, poor, youth and illegal alien voters, we are told over and over by Attorney General Eric Holder and race hustler Al Sharpton, are evil conservatives who support voter photo ID laws to help ensure honest elections.
In 2012, Pew researchers reported that more than 24 million voter registrations were inaccurate, outdated or duplicates, that nearly 2 million dead people were on the rolls, and that nearly three million people were registered in more than one state. For more, see the American Civil Rights Union’s paper, The Truth about Voter ID.
There is only one reason to oppose common-sense electoral reforms and to push instead for universal registration – to make it easier to commit vote fraud.
And who typically benefits? The answer is suggested by the fact that Democrats – with notable exceptions such as black Rhode Island legislators – vehemently and absurdly oppose voter ID laws as “racist.” Never mind that voter ID critics have no problem with requiring identification for everyday activities such as buying beer or cashing a check.
Mr. Obama did not like the results of the mid-term elections in 2014, and so he wants to rig the system more to his liking. Mandatory voting is absurd in a free society and it should drown in the sea of discarded ideas.
Democracy is a horrible thing.
It is two wolves and one lamb deciding what to eat for lunch.
We need to export republican forms of government, NOT democracy.
Velkom To Kamp Klinton.
You Vill Have Fun!
Zat Is Ze Order Today!
One of my favorite definitions of a “progressive” is that it is a person who will allow you to do anything you want - as long as it’s compulsory.
- [I]t is religion and morality alone which can establish the principles upon which freedom can securely stand. The only foundation of a free constitution is pure virtue.
- [W]e have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion. . . . Our constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.
- The moment the idea is admitted into society, that property is not as sacred as the laws of God, and that there is not a force of law and public justice to protect it, anarchy and tyranny commence. If "Thou shalt not covet," and "Thou shalt not steal," were not commandments of Heaven, they must be made inviolable precepts in every society, before it can be civilized or made free.
John Quincy Adams
- The law given from Sinai was a civil and municipal as well as a moral and religious code; it contained many statutes . . . of universal application-laws essential to the existence of men in society, and most of which have been enacted by every nation which ever professed any code of laws.
- There are three points of doctrine the belief of which forms the foundation of all morality. The first is the existence of God; the second is the immortality of the human soul; and the third is a future state of rewards and punishments. Suppose it possible for a man to disbelieve either of these three articles of faith and that man will have no conscience, he will have no other law than that of the tiger or the shark. The laws of man may bind him in chains or may put him to death, but they never can make him wise, virtuous, or happy.
Samuel Adams -
[N]either the wisest constitution nor the wisest laws will secure the liberty and happiness of a people whose manners are universally corrupt.
Fisher Ames (Framer of the First Amendment)
- Our liberty depends on our education, our laws, and habits . . . it is founded on morals and religion, whose authority reigns in the heart, and on the influence all these produce on public opinion before that opinion governs rulers.
Charles Carroll (Signer of the Declaration of Independence)
- Without morals a republic cannot subsist any length of time; they therefore who are decrying the Christian religion, whose morality is so sublime & pure, [and] which denounces against the wicked eternal misery, and [which] insured to the good eternal happiness, are undermining the solid foundation of morals, the best security for the duration of free governments.
Oliver Ellsworth (Chief-Justice of the Supreme Court)
- [T]he primary objects of government are the peace, order, and prosperity of society. . . . To the promotion of these objects, particularly in a republican government, good morals are essential. Institutions for the promotion of good morals are therefore objects of legislative provision and support: and among these . . . religious institutions are eminently useful and important. . . . [T]he legislature, charged with the great interests of the community, may, and ought to countenance, aid and protect religious institutions—institutions wisely calculated to direct men to the performance of all the duties arising from their connection with each other, and to prevent or repress those evils which flow from unrestrained passion.
Benjamin Franklin
- [O]nly a virtuous people are capable of freedom. As nations become corrupt and vicious, they have more need of masters.
- I have lived, Sir, a long time, and the longer I live, the more convincing proofs I see of this truth, that God governs in the affairs of men. And if a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without His notice, is it probable that an empire can rise without his aid? We have been assured, Sir, in the Sacred Writings, that "except the Lord build the House, they labor in vain that build it." I firmly believe this; and I also believe that without His concurring aid we shall succeed in this political building no better, than the Builders of Babel: We shall be divided by our partial local interests; our projects will be confounded, and we ourselves shall become a reproach and bye word down to future ages. And what is worse, mankind may hereafter from this unfortunate instance, despair of establishing governments by human wisdom and leave it to chance, war and conquest.
I therefore beg leave to move that henceforth prayers imploring the assistance of Heaven, and its blessings on our deliberations be held in this Assembly every morning before we proceed to business, and that one or more of the clergy of this city be requested to officiate in that service.
Thomas Jefferson
- Give up money, give up fame, give up science, give the earth itself and all it contains rather than do an immoral act. And never suppose that in any possible situation, or under any circumstances, it is best for you to do a dishonorable thing, however slightly so it may appear to you. Whenever you are to do a thing, though it can never be known but to yourself, ask yourself how you would act were all the world looking at you, and act accordingly. Encourage all your virtuous dispositions, and exercise them whenever an opportunity arises, being assured that they will gain strength by exercise, as a limb of the body does, and that exercise will make them habitual. From the practice of the purest virtue, you may be assured you will derive the most sublime comforts in every moment of life, and in the moment of death.
- The doctrines of Jesus are simple, and tend all to the happiness of mankind.
- I concur with the author in considering the moral precepts of Jesus as more pure, correct, and sublime than those of ancient philosophers.
Richard Henry Lee (Signer of the Declaration of Independence
- It is certainly true that a popular government cannot flourish without virtue in the people.
James McHenry (Signer of the Constitution)
- [P]ublic utility pleads most forcibly for the general distribution of the Holy Scriptures. The doctrine they preach, the obligations they impose, the punishment they threaten, the rewards they promise, the stamp and image of divinity they bear, which produces a conviction of their truths, can alone secure to society, order and peace, and to our courts of justice and constitutions of government, purity, stability and usefulness. In vain, without the Bible, we increase penal laws and draw entrenchments around our institutions. Bibles are strong entrenchments. Where they abound, men cannot pursue wicked courses, and at the same time enjoy quiet conscience.
Jedediah Morse (Patriot and "Father of American Geography")
- To the kindly influence of Christianity we owe that degree of civil freedom, and political and social happiness which mankind now enjoys. . . . Whenever the pillars of Christianity shall be overthrown, our present republican forms of government, and all blessings which flow from them, must fall with them.
Pennsylvania Supreme Court
No free government now exists in the world, unless where Christianity is acknowledged, and is the religion of the country.
Benjamin Rush (Signer of the Declaration of Independence)
- The only foundation for a useful education in a republic is to be laid in religion. Without this there can be no virtue, and without virtue there can be no liberty, and liberty is the object and life of all republican governments.
We profess to be republicans, and yet we neglect the only means of establishing and perpetuating our republican forms of government, that is, the universal education of our youth in the principles of Christianity by the means of the Bible. For this Divine Book, above all others, favors that equality among mankind, that respect for just laws, and those sober and frugal virtues, which constitute the soul of republicanism.
By renouncing the Bible, philosophers swing from their moorings upon all moral subjects. . . . It is the only correct map of the human heart that ever has been published. . . . All systems of religion, morals, and government not founded upon it [the Bible] must perish, and how consoling the thought, it will not only survive the wreck of these systems but the world itself.
- Remember that national crimes require national punishments, and without declaring what punishment awaits this evil, you may venture to assure them that it cannot pass with impunity, unless God shall cease to be just or merciful.
Joseph Story (Supreme Court Justice)
- Indeed, the right of a society or government to [participate] in matters of religion will hardly be contested by any persons who believe that piety, religion, and morality are intimately connected with the well being of the state and indispensable to the administrations of civil justice. The promulgation of the great doctrines of religion—the being, and attributes, and providence of one Almighty God; the responsibility to Him for all our actions, founded upon moral accountability; a future state of rewards and punishments; the cultivation of all the personal, social, and benevolent virtues—these never can be a matter of indifference in any well-ordered community. It is, indeed, difficult to conceive how any civilized society can well exist without them.
George Washington
- While just government protects all in their religious rights, true religion affords to government its surest support.
- Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable supports. In vain would that man claim the tribute of patriotism who should labor to subvert these great pillars of human happiness, these firmest props of the duties of man and citizens. The mere politician, equally with the pious man, ought to respect and to cherish them. A volume could not trace all their connexions with private and public felicity. Let it simply be asked, Where is the security for property, for reputation, for life, if the sense of religious obligation desert the oaths, which are the instruments of investigation in Courts of Justice?
And let us with caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion. Whatever may be conceded to the influence of refined education on minds of peculiar structure, reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle. It is substantially true, that virtue or morality is a necessary spring of popular government. The rule, indeed, extends with more or less force to every species of free government. Who, that is a sincere friend to it, can look with indifference upon attempts to shake the foundation of the fabric?
- [T]he [federal] government . . . can never be in danger of degenerating into a monarchy, and oligarchy, an aristocracy, or any other despotic or oppressive form so long as there shall remain any virtue in the body of the people.
Daniel Webster (Early American Jurist and Senator)
- [I]f we and our posterity reject religious instruction and authority, violate the rules of eternal justice, trifle with the injunctions of morality, and recklessly destroy the political constitution which holds us together, no man can tell how sudden a catastrophe may overwhelm us that shall bury all our glory in profound obscurity.
Noah Webster (Founding Educator)
- The most perfect maxims and examples for regulating your social conduct and domestic economy, as well as the best rules of morality and religion, are to be found in the Bible. . . . The moral principles and precepts found in the scriptures ought to form the basis of all our civil constitutions and laws. These principles and precepts have truth, immutable truth, for their foundation. . . . All the evils which men suffer from vice, crime, ambition, injustice, oppression, slavery and war, proceed from their despising or neglecting the precepts contained in the Bible. . . . For instruction then in social, religious and civil duties resort to the scriptures for the best precepts.
James Wilson (Signer of the Constitution)
- Far from being rivals or enemies, religion and law are twin sisters, friends, and mutual assistants. Indeed, these two sciences run into each other. The divine law, as discovered by reason and the moral sense, forms an essential part of both.
Robert Winthrop (Former Speaker of the US House of Representatives)
- Men, in a word, must necessarily be controlled either by a power within them or by a power without them; either by the Word of God or by the strong arm of man; either by the Bible or by the bayonet.
Our problem is quite clear. We are no longer a nation of just and moral people. Our leaders and political parties merely reflect who we are. Probably stolen from another Freeper but I forget who.
State participation in the senate is what ensured separation of powers. The 10th Amendment cannot guarantee itself.
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