Posted on 05/15/2014 11:58:07 AM PDT by PoloSec
On Wednesday, former Congressman Allen West told Ben Shapiro that he is considering a run for President in 2016.
Shapiro: And I am not saying something’s going to happen. But I am hearing very strong rumors—we have to ask— there have been very strong rumors that you are interested in throwing your hat into the ring for the 2016 presidential nomination on the Republican side of the aisle. Is there any truth to those rumors?
West: Well look, the thing is this. As I was doing the motorcycle ride across the country and wherever we stopped, you know, fuel stop, overnight stop, people would come up and they would ask me that question.
It would be very disrespectful and dismissive of great Americans if I did not step back and take the time to consider it and pray about it and talk it over with close confidantes. So that what I will do. And we will make the right decision, not just for me but for the country and for the future of this great constitutional republic.
So am I considering it? Yes. I am considering it. That does not mean I am going to jump it and do it, but in respect to those people who are so very kind and believe that I have that level of capacity and capability, that’s what I have to do for them.
(Excerpt) Read more at thepunditpress.com ...
thank you!!!!!!! s/2016 Democrat candidate
Me too. A couple of terms in the Senate to let the rancor from the first black president die down. Plus it would get rid of Rubnesty. :=)
That, and a frenzy of brogasms from people who can’t think for themselves.
You’d rather have an “establishment” type politician to vote for? I’d rather see anyone who believes in and will support the Constitution.
I want someone with executive experience and a political record.
I want a record, not statements. West’s record is very short and mixed.
Thx!
This is the man who stated he would walk through Hell with a can of gasoline for his troops! How do you think he would of reacted to the call for help from the consulate in Benghazi? I think this man knows how to surround himself with the right people. I would work to get this man elected!
I called this in 2012. He should have been Romney's VP choice, IMO. Would it be enough to cast the election to Romney? Don't know. But he would have had national exposure and scare the crap out of the Dems.
YEP!!!!!!!!
This is just one reason I’m supporting another GREAT candidate who may run for Pres one day...
He’s WINNING his Senate race against a GOP-e Congressman....
He’s Ted Cruz.. just a shade darker. :)
I was hoping he would be more serious, and seek to hold office.
What was the reason he couldn’t win his own district?
Back during the FReeper purge of 2011/2012, everyone focused on the "electible" with absolutely no one knowing who was actually "electible" but the "group think" made their choice and ultimately banned anyone who was not in line with that "group think"
This site lost a lot of great patriots during that time and I suspect it will lose more in the next couple years simply because those who will ultimately be banned will focus on the "Viable" candidate.......
As a side note, I will vote my choice in the primary and since I have no control over all the other primary voters across this country, I will ultimately vote for their choice in the presidential election.......
He got Gerrymandered.
Agreed.
At the very least, America would have a potential candidate before them who knows from his study of history that ours is a "constitutional republic," not a "democracy" which is bound to adhere to "international norms."
Tocqueville visited in the American wilderness of the 1830's, whom he described in the following manner:
Congratulations to West for correctly identifying the Constitutional structuring of "the People's" form of self-government left to future generations by the Founders! He is in good company, as the following excerpts from an historical document will confirm."It cannot be doubted that in the United States the instruction of the people powerfully contributes to the support of the democratic republic; and such must always be the case, I believe, where the in struction which enlightens the understanding is not separated from the moral education ...."
"The American citizen, he said, "..will inform you what his rights are and by what means he exercises them .. In the United States, politics are the end and aim of education ... every citizen receives the elementary notions of human knowledge; he is taught, moreover, the doctrines and the evidences of his religion, the history of his country, and the leading features of its Constitution .... it is extremely rare to find a man imperfectly acquainted with all these things, and a person wholly ignorant of them is a sort of phenomenon .... It is difficult to imagine the incredible rapidity with which thought circulates in the midst of these deserts [wilderness]. I do not think that so much intellectual activity exists in the most enlightened and populous districts of France."
John Adams' son, John Quincy, was 9 when the Declaration of Independence was written, 20 when the Constitution was framed, and from his teen years, served in various capacities in both the Legislative and Executive branches of the government, including as President. His words on this subject should be instructive on the subject at hand.
In 1839, he was invited by the New York Historical Society to deliver the "Jubilee" Address honoring the 50th Anniversary of the Inauguration of George Washington. He delivered that lengthy discourse which should be read by all who love liberty, for it traced the history of the development of the ideas underlying and the actions leading to the establishment of the Constitution which structured the United States government. His 50th-year summation seems to be a better source for understanding the kind of government the Founders formed than those of recent historians and politicians. He addresses the ideas of "democracy" and "republic" throughout, but here are some of his concluding remarks:
"Every change of a President of the United States, has exhibited some variety of policy from that of his predecessor. In more than one case, the change has extended to political and even to moral principle; but the policy of the country has been fashioned far more by the influences of public opinion, and the prevailing humors in the two Houses of Congress, than by the judgment, the will, or the principles of the President of the United States. The President himself is no more than a representative of public opinion at the time of his election; and as public opinion is subject to great and frequent fluctuations, he must accommodate his policy to them; or the people will speedily give him a successor; or either House of Congress will effectually control his power. It is thus, and in no other sense that the Constitution of the United States is democratic - for the government of our country, instead of a Democracy the most simple, is the most complicated government on the face of the globe. From the immense extent of our territory, the difference of manners, habits, opinions, and above all, the clashing interests of the North, South, East, and West, public opinion formed by the combination of numerous aggregates, becomes itself a problem of compound arithmetic, which nothing but the result of the popular elections can solve.
"It has been my purpose, Fellow-Citizens, in this discourse to show:-
"1. That this Union was formed by a spontaneous movement of the people of thirteen English Colonies; all subjects of the King of Great Britain - bound to him in allegiance, and to the British empire as their country. That the first object of this Union,was united resistance against oppression, and to obtain from the government of their country redress of their wrongs.
"2. That failing in this object, their petitions having been spurned, and the oppressions of which they complained, aggravated beyond endurance, their Delegates in Congress, in their name and by their authority, issued the Declaration of Independence - proclaiming them to the world as one people, absolving them from their ties and oaths of allegiance to their king and country - renouncing that country; declared the UNITED Colonies, Independent States, and announcing that this ONE PEOPLE of thirteen united independent states, by that act, assumed among the powers of the earth, that separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature's God entitled them.
"3. That in justification of themselves for this act of transcendent power, they proclaimed the principles upon which they held all lawful government upon earth to be founded - which principles were, the natural, unalienable, imprescriptible rights of man, specifying among them, life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness - that the institution of government is to secure to men in society the possession of those rights: that the institution, dissolution, and reinstitution of government, belong exclusively to THE PEOPLE under a moral responsibility to the Supreme Ruler of the universe; and that all the just powers of government are derived from the consent of the governed.
"4. That under this proclamation of principles, the dissolution of allegiance to the British king, and the compatriot connection with the people of the British empire, were accomplished; and the one people of the United States of America, became one separate sovereign independent power, assuming an equal station among the nations of the earth.
"5. That this one people did not immediately institute a government for themselves. But instead of it, their delegates in Congress, by authority from their separate state legislatures, without voice or consultation of the people, instituted a mere confederacy.
"6. That this confederacy totally departed from the principles of the Declaration of independence, and substituted instead of the constituent power of the people, an assumed sovereignty of each separate state, as the source of all its authority.
"7. That as a primitive source of power, this separate state sovereignty,was not only a departure from the principles of the Declaration of Independence, but directly contrary to, and utterly incompatible with them.
"8. That the tree was made known by its fruits. That after five years wasted in its preparation, the confederation dragged out a miserable existence of eight years more, and expired like a candle in the socket, having brought the union itself to the verge of dissolution.
"9. That the Constitution of the United States was a return to the principles of the Declaration of independence, and the exclusive constituent power of the people. That it was the work of the ONE PEOPLE of the United States; and that those United States, though doubled in numbers, still constitute as a nation, but ONE PEOPLE.
"10. That this Constitution, making due allowance for the imperfections and errors incident to all human affairs, has under all the vicissitudes and changes of war and peace, been administered upon those same principles, during a career of fifty years.
"11. That its fruits have been, still making allowance for human imperfection, a more perfect union, established justice, domestic tranquility, provision for the common defence, promotion of the general welfare, and the enjoyment of the blessings of liberty by the constituent people, and their posterity to the present day.
"And now the future is all before us, and Providence our guide."
In an earlier paragraph, he had stated:
"But this institution was republican, and even democratic. And here not to be misunderstood, I mean by democratic, a government, the administration of which must always be rendered comfortable to that predominating public opinion . . . and by republican I mean a government reposing, not upon the virtues or the powers of any one man - not upon that honor, which Montesquieu lays down as the fundamental principle of monarchy - far less upon that fear which he pronounces the basis of despotism; but upon that virtue which he, a noble of aristocratic peerage, and the subject of an absolute monarch, boldly proclaims as a fundamental principle of republican government. The Constitution of the United States was republican and democratic - but the experience of all former ages had shown that of all human governments, democracy was the most unstable, fluctuating and short-lived; and it was obvious that if virtue - the virtue of the people, was the foundation of republican government, the stability and duration of the government must depend upon the stability and duration of the virtue by which it is sustained."
Maybe he can stand beside Santorum (another who lost his last election) in the primary debates.
Just who the GOP needs — pols who can’t retain office trying to run for the presidency.
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