NEW POLITICAL PARTY

Ladies and gentlemen, I’ve had the enjoyment of reading a tremendous amount of information on FreeRepublic, and the one patently obvious fact is that the FreeRepublic is the site of American Patriots. I want to make a proposal. I don’t make it lightly and most importantly, I think the time is ripe for what I’m about to suggest.

First, a little about me. I am a retired U.S. Coast Guard Senior Chief Petty Officer, that’s E8 for our non-nautical brethren. I served honorably from January, 1970 through May, 1991. I’m currently employed by a major wireless company, and otherwise lead a very quiet, sedate life. I have been growing increasingly disgruntled with our national government, as I’m sure some of you have as well.

My proposal is that we create a new political party, called the American Veteran Party. There can be two types of membership. A regular membership is where the only requirement is that you be an honorably discharged or retired veterans; or currently serving on active duty or in an element of the Guard or Reserve. Associate membership can be obtained by being sponsored by a regular member.

The party’s platform can be very simple, if you run as a member of the American Veteran Party, you swear that you will always represent the wishes and desires of the residents and voters of the district you represent, that you will obey and adhere to the principles and tenets of government espoused in the Declaration of Independence, The U.S. Constitution and the Federalist Papers..

I came to this drastic conclusion after watching the immigration debacle in the U.S. Senate in June. The two major parties no longer represent the residents and voters or their respective districts and states and I think that if we were to turn this situation around, it will have to be done by those who have always been ready to protect and defend the Constitution, the country and Americans – the U.S. military. The members of Congress forget their oaths as soon as they’ve recited the last syllable and they’ve proven time and time again, that they hold both the U.S. military and voters in complete and utter contempt. The only reason they debase themselves to meet the voters is to garner the votes we cast.

We always hear the politicians proclaim themselves as being patriots. Well, people, we ARE the patriots. We’re the ones who have volunteered and put our lives on the line, the politicians haven’t. I strongly believe that our love of country is along the lines that I had and still have, which was developed by my parents in the 1950s and 1960s. It’s a very simplistic, straight forward kind of love. Most of us have been in some third world crap spot and we know that America is the exception and not the rule. We’ve seen national governments which are universally corrupt and whose primary purpose in life is the continued subjugation and exploitation of their people.

I’m just floating this idea, since there seems to be a large number of veterans and activity duty types interacting on this board.

If you don’t agree, just let me know why. I pray these are not the ramblings of an old demented veteran who is sick and tired of seeing his country being ripped to shreds by politicians who look at the military and see the very worst this nation has to offer, when I know we looking at the very best..

Conservatives have long understood that we have a government designed for representative legislators rather than pliebisitory delegates.

Certainly legislators run with commitments to various issue positions beyond a collection of principles, but Represtation has functions beyond just what the constituants feel on a particular day.

We hate it when representatives and elected officals change with how the wind is blowing and govern by polls.

Perhaps, the original conservative, Edmund Burke explained it best when Bristol was upset that their temporary local merchantile interests weren't being knee-jerk voted by Burke and gave him some grief over it:

I am sorry I cannot conclude without saying a word on a topic touched upon by my worthy colleague. I wish that topic had been passed by at a time when I have so little leisure to discuss it. But since he has thought proper to throw it out, I owe you a clear explanation of my poor sentiments on that subject.
He tells you that "the topic of instructions has occasioned much altercation and uneasiness in this city;" and he expresses himself (if I understand him rightly) in favour of the coercive authority of such instructions.
Certainly, gentlemen, it ought to be the happiness and glory of a representative to live in the strictest union, the closest correspondence, and the most unreserved communication with his constituents. Their wishes ought to have great weight with him; their opinion, high respect; their business, unremitted attention. It is his duty to sacrifice his repose, his pleasures, his satisfactions, to theirs; and above all, ever, and in all cases, to prefer their interest to his own. But his unbiassed opinion, his mature judgment, his enlightened conscience, he ought not to sacrifice to you, to any man, or to any set of men living. These he does not derive from your pleasure; no, nor from the law and the constitution. They are a trust from Providence, for the abuse of which he is deeply answerable. Your representative owes you, not his industry only, but his judgment; and he betrays, instead of serving you, if he sacrifices it to your opinion.
My worthy colleague says, his will ought to be subservient to yours. If that be all, the thing is innocent. If government were a matter of will upon any side, yours, without question, ought to be superior. But government and legislation are matters of reason and judgment, and not of inclination; and what sort of reason is that, in which the determination precedes the discussion; in which one set of men deliberate, and another decide; and where those who form the conclusion are perhaps three hundred miles distant from those who hear the arguments?
To deliver an opinion, is the right of all men; that of constituents is a weighty and respectable opinion, which a representative ought always to rejoice to hear; and which he ought always most seriously to consider. But authoritative instructions; mandates issued, which the member is bound blindly and implicitly to obey, to vote, and to argue for, though contrary to the clearest conviction of his judgment and conscience,--these are things utterly unknown to the laws of this land, and which arise from a fundamental mistake of the whole order and tenor of our constitution.
Parliament is not a congress of ambassadors from different and hostile interests; which interests each must maintain, as an agent and advocate, against other agents and advocates; but parliament is a deliberative assembly of one nation, with one interest, that of the whole; where, not local purposes, not local prejudices, ought to guide, but the general good, resulting from the general reason of the whole. You choose a member indeed; but when you have chosen him, he is not member of Bristol, but he is a member of parliament. If the local constituent should have an interest, or should form an hasty opinion, evidently opposite to the real good of the rest of the community, the member for that place ought to be as far, as any other, from any endeavour to give it effect. I beg pardon for saying so much on this subject. I have been unwillingly drawn into it; but I shall ever use a respectful frankness of communication with you. Your faithful friend, your devoted servant, I shall be to the end of my life: a flatterer you do not wish for.

We are saddened that office holding has turned into a mere vocation, but delegates rather than representatives will only make that matter worse.

Principles are what is needed. They are required in a measure superior, not just equal, to the quantaty held by the local electorate on any given day.

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