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'Freedom Is About Authority': Excerpts From Giuliani Speech on Crime
New York Times ^ | March 22, 2007

Posted on 03/22/2007 11:28:22 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife

...We constantly present the false impression that government can solve problems that government in America was designed not to solve. Families are significantly less important in the development of children today than they were 30 or 40 years ago. Religion has less influence than it did 30 or 40 years ago. Communities don't mean what they meant 30 or 40 years ago.

As Americans, we're not sure we share values. We're sometimes even afraid to use the word values. We talk about teaching ethics in schools -- people say, "What ethics? Whose ethics? Maybe we can't." And they confuse that with teaching of religion. And we are afraid to reaffirm the basics upon which a lawful and a decent society are based. We're almost embarrassed by it.

.... What we don't see is that freedom is not a concept in which people can do anything they want, be anything they can be. Freedom is about authority. Freedom is about the willingness of every single human being to cede to lawful authority a great deal of discretion about what you do.

... The fact is that we're fooling people if we suggest to them the solutions to these very, very deep-seated problems are going to be found in government.

... They are going to have to be just as solid and just as strong in teaching every single youngster their responsibility for citizenship. We're going to find the answer when schools once again train citizens. Schools exist in America and have always existed to train responsible citizens of the United States of America.

If they don't do that, it's very hard to hold us together as a country, because it's shared values that hold us together.

(Excerpt) Read more at query.nytimes.com ...


TOPICS: Editorial; Government; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: electionpresident; fascistnotamerican; freedom; freedomisslavery; giuliani; ignoranceisstrength; rudy; rudygiuliani; rudytherino; stoprudy2008; warispeace
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To: Sun

GReat...show me where in the Constitution it instructs the President to honor the laws of God.


301 posted on 03/22/2007 9:54:06 PM PDT by Luis Gonzalez (Some people see the world as they would want it to be, effective people see the world as it is.)
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To: Luis Gonzalez

"The Constittion is the law of the land."

And the constitution does NOT cede a great deal of authority over people's everyday lives.


302 posted on 03/22/2007 9:54:07 PM PDT by flashbunny (<--- Free Anti-Rino graphics! See Rudy the Rino get exposed as a liberal with his own words!)
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To: Luis Gonzalez

"show me where in the Constitution it instructs the President to honor the laws of God."

Show me in the constitution where we were instructed to "cede to lawful authority a GREAT DEAL of discretion about what you do".


303 posted on 03/22/2007 9:56:00 PM PDT by flashbunny (<--- Free Anti-Rino graphics! See Rudy the Rino get exposed as a liberal with his own words!)
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To: The Spirit Of Allegiance

I am actually arguing in favor of the laws of the land, and you people are arguing against them.

Laws without authority are meaningless.

Now, when are you going to get around to explaining what was wrong with what Rudy said...not with what you THINK Rudy said, bit with what he actually said.


304 posted on 03/22/2007 9:56:24 PM PDT by Luis Gonzalez (Some people see the world as they would want it to be, effective people see the world as it is.)
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To: Luis Gonzalez
Ah, but I'm illustrating that our greatest Presidents disagreed with your assertion.

""The God who gave us life, gave us liberty at the same time; the hand of force may destroy, but cannot disjoin them." - Thomas Jefferson

305 posted on 03/22/2007 9:56:39 PM PDT by EternalVigilance (To have your eco-sins forgiven, just buy Carbon Indulgences!)
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To: Luis Gonzalez

"We can discuss whether he had the authority to regulate (a word found in the 2nd) guns as a mayor of a city, as opposed to acting as the President of the nation and being restricted by the Second Amendment from infringing on the RTKABA."

Heck, he called for more federal gun control law as well, so the rudyphile claim that was a "local issue" is laughable.


306 posted on 03/22/2007 9:57:10 PM PDT by flashbunny (<--- Free Anti-Rino graphics! See Rudy the Rino get exposed as a liberal with his own words!)
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To: flashbunny

You don't think so?

Have you read your State's Constitution lately?


307 posted on 03/22/2007 9:57:12 PM PDT by Luis Gonzalez (Some people see the world as they would want it to be, effective people see the world as it is.)
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To: Luis Gonzalez
Laws without authority are meaningless.

All true authority comes ultimately from God.

308 posted on 03/22/2007 9:57:25 PM PDT by EternalVigilance (To have your eco-sins forgiven, just buy Carbon Indulgences!)
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To: Luis Gonzalez
...in other words, in writing the Constitution, the "willingness of every single human being to cede to lawful authority a great deal of discretion about what you do" was set in place for the United States by the people of the United States.

It has been recognized since time immemorial that maintaing order requires that people cede to lawful authority some of their descretion about what they do. Rudy's usage of the term "great deal" seems to demand a much broader concession of liberty.

309 posted on 03/22/2007 9:58:08 PM PDT by supercat (Sony delenda est.)
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To: EternalVigilance

Illustrate the place in the Constitutio where it instructs a president to abide by the laws of God.

As a matter of fact...show me where God is mentioned in the Constitution, other than in the date.


310 posted on 03/22/2007 9:58:21 PM PDT by Luis Gonzalez (Some people see the world as they would want it to be, effective people see the world as it is.)
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To: Luis Gonzalez

The topic was not about my state's constitution.

The topic was the founding of this country. That means the US constitution and the BOR, not the state constitutions.

Once again you try to change the subject when your weak arguments fail.



311 posted on 03/22/2007 9:58:56 PM PDT by flashbunny (<--- Free Anti-Rino graphics! See Rudy the Rino get exposed as a liberal with his own words!)
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To: Luis Gonzalez
"I speak as a man of the world to men of the world; and I say to you, Search the Scriptures! The Bible is the book of all others, to be read at all ages, and in all conditions of human life; not to be read once or twice or thrice through, and then laid aside, but to be read in small portions of one or two chapters every day, and never to be intermitted, unless by some overruling necessity." - John Quincy Adams
312 posted on 03/22/2007 9:59:38 PM PDT by EternalVigilance (To have your eco-sins forgiven, just buy Carbon Indulgences!)
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To: EternalVigilance

The topic is what Rudy said, and as an aside, the question of where in the Constitution it instructs the president to abide by the laws of God...put up or shut up.


313 posted on 03/22/2007 9:59:54 PM PDT by Luis Gonzalez (Some people see the world as they would want it to be, effective people see the world as it is.)
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To: Luis Gonzalez

"We can discuss whether he had the authority to regulate (a word found in the 2nd) guns as a mayor of a city, as opposed to acting as the President of the nation and being restricted by the Second Amendment from infringing on the RTKABA"

No problem so long as you admit that you understand the difference between regulate and prohibit. So when Julie was "using gun control," was he regulating or prohibiting?


314 posted on 03/22/2007 10:01:32 PM PDT by takenoprisoner
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To: Luis Gonzalez
As a matter of fact...show me where God is mentioned in the Constitution, other than in the date.

That's like saying, "Show me how trees have leaves, except on their branches."

315 posted on 03/22/2007 10:01:51 PM PDT by EternalVigilance (To have your eco-sins forgiven, just buy Carbon Indulgences!)
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To: Luis Gonzalez

Actually I AGREE with you that there must be authority. It is noted in my previous posts, albeit not in those words.

Where we may differ is that in anarchy, individuals are sovereign but accountable to nobody else.

Back to my question about your support for our laws.
Are you in agreement with the de facto law of the Land?


316 posted on 03/22/2007 10:03:07 PM PDT by The Spirit Of Allegiance (Public Employees: Honor Your Oaths! Defend the Constitution from Enemies--Foreign and Domestic!)
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To: Luis Gonzalez

"The topic is what Rudy said,"

Yet you keep changing it to different things whenever people poke holes in your arguments.


317 posted on 03/22/2007 10:04:56 PM PDT by flashbunny (<--- Free Anti-Rino graphics! See Rudy the Rino get exposed as a liberal with his own words!)
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To: EternalVigilance

I wonder where those "blessings of liberty" they talked about in the preamble came from?

Did rudy travel back in time and bless us all with liberty?


318 posted on 03/22/2007 10:05:51 PM PDT by flashbunny (<--- Free Anti-Rino graphics! See Rudy the Rino get exposed as a liberal with his own words!)
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To: Luis Gonzalez
Actually, I was dealing directly with a one-line quote from you:

A President is bound to honor the Constitution, not the laws of God.

And have already showed that the first four of them disagreed with you. Want more?

By the way, when they take their oath of office, they finish by saying, "So, help me God." George Washington added those words, which are still used to this day, with a hand laid on the Holy Bible.

319 posted on 03/22/2007 10:06:19 PM PDT by EternalVigilance (To have your eco-sins forgiven, just buy Carbon Indulgences!)
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To: flashbunny

Good point.


320 posted on 03/22/2007 10:06:51 PM PDT by EternalVigilance (To have your eco-sins forgiven, just buy Carbon Indulgences!)
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