Posted on 03/16/2002 1:32:37 PM PST by humbletheFiend
Conservative pundit Alan Keyes has never been one to shy from controversy, but his latest column for the Internet news and commentary site World Net Daily comes as quite a shock to those of us who believed that Ambassador Keyes was a strict Constitutionalist.
In his column, “Shunning the Intolerable”, Keyes writes in response to a comic strip by artist Ted Rall, in which Rall skewers the industry of 9/11 victimhood, and the associated greed that has overwhelmed the issue. One can understand Keyes discomfort with the satire. It is very direct, and Rall pulls no punches with what he obviously sees as an ambulance chase of epic proportions. Rall is known for his biting satire, and his hyperbole is more than evident in this strip. However, it is Alan Keyes’ reaction to Rall’s satire that is most interesting.
Keyes accuses Rall of “an assault on the decent national sensibilities crucial to the war effort” for his act of, as Keyes perceives it, trivializing the tragic events of 9/11. Not satisfied with that, he then proceeds to crush the Constitution under one of the most contrived excuses for the suppression of civil liberties published by a conservative since the attacks took place. Examining the following excerpted quotes shows a disturbing willingness on Keyes part to use government to suppress free speech.
Quote one:
"Of course, an entire people cannot have so perfect an understanding as its statesmen of the causes that justify, even require, going to war. Human history has taught us time and time again that as the simple faith of the peasant necessarily lacks much of the precision of the theologian's doctrine, so the judgment of any nation will always lack much of the sophistication of the statesman's subtle reasoning."
--- Just what is Keyes saying here? The American people are not ignorant peasants toiling in some remote fiefdom. We are supposed to be an informed electorate. As such, while we lack access to all of the information available to our national leaders (by their design, not coincidentally), we should certainly be able to grasp the overriding moral justification of committing to the act of war. What does Keyes believe endows our leaders with any degree of infallibility when it comes to the issue of committing America's youth to death on foreign shores, not to mention the act of killing foreign nationals as an expression of our foreign policy in the extreme? More to the point, would he be making these statements if Bill Clinton was still president, or is this simply because he has faith in a Republican administration?
Quote two:
". . . the importance of such events, such images, as Pearl Harbor aflame and the Lusitania sinking beneath the waves. These events became slogans precisely because the proximate cause of a just war, which exemplifies the evil being fought, has to be remembered for what it was if the people are to maintain their steady judgment and purpose. Such events are essential icons of the people's faith that their cause is just."
---This is absolute trash, especially when, with the benefit of hindsight, we understand the complexities of both the Lusitania attack (munitions being transported on passenger ships), and the well-documented suspicions surrounding FDR's advance knowledge of the attack on Pearl Harbor. In other words, unethical leaders could manipulate these iconic events so as to create popular support for an unjust war. The events and images do not, in and of themselves, create the justification for acts of aggression against foreigners. The word for that, I believe, is "propaganda."
Secondarily, if iconic images of unjust assaults against a sovereign nation were enough to commit the populace to war, haven't we provided plenty of those images to our own enemies in the past?
Quote three:
". . . Mr. Ted Rall should have been fired immediately by those with professional authority over him, or in contractual relations with him. Such action in defense of the decent judgment of this people in regard to 9-11 would be more than sufficient to keep such as Mr. Rall from subverting our national resolve."
--- Just how fragile is our "national resolve" if it can be subverted by a comic strip? I see Rall's comic as political speech in the purest sense, and that should be protected speech, not lumped in, as Keyes does, with pornography, simply because he finds the satire offensive.
Quote four:
"But it is worth remembering that when serious and sustained attempts to undermine public opinion on a matter genuinely essential to national life cannot be resisted by other means, governmental action may be necessary. For governmental action is also the action of a free people. Such was the case, despite all the continuing petulant complaints of superficial 'civil libertarians,' when President Lincoln was obliged to suppress rebellion in some northern citizens (some of whom happened to be newspaper editors), so that the rebellion of many more southern citizens could be effectively ended, and our great Civil War to maintain the Union brought to a victorious conclusion."
--- This statement is so shocking I am going to break it down:
". . . when serious and sustained attempts to undermine public opinion on a matter genuinely essential to national life cannot be resisted by other means, governmental action may be necessary. For governmental action is also the action of a free people."
--- What can Keyes possibly mean by this statement? Take 9/11 and George W. Bush’s response out of the equation, and just read the statement straight up. Is Keyes saying that free political speech is limited by the degree to which it might possibly change public opinion regarding a course of action to which the government is committed? It would appear so. If the government senses that the opposition is gaining traction, then, Keyes insists, it is the responsibility of the government to act to suppress the offensive speech. Keyes then goes on to further state that "governmental action is also the action of a free people." That statement is so incredible it virtually defies comment.
Keyes subsequent support of Lincoln's atrocious suspension of American's civil liberties during the War Between the States is just an extension of his flawed logic. It is a frightening notion that Keyes, an individual who is seen as an icon of strict Constitutional interpretation and a defender of individual rights, would deem it acceptable for the President of the United States to incarcerate citizens of this nation because he fears their influence on the opinions of other Americans.
Once again, we are reminded how tenuous our civil liberties are, and how important it is that we remain constantly vigilant as individuals to their eradication by an overreaching and paranoid government seeking to use force to preserve itself against perceived enemies.
As a neo-Keyesian, I am more or less incapable of a nasty post.
I'm off to get some pizza now and I am leaving you in charge until my return.
Keep the peace, rdf.
Keyes hasn't changed. He is just addressing more issues on his show in more depth, than he did on the campaign trail. And on a lot of those issus he is a mainstream very conservative Pubbie (like on the national sales tax, which I find horrific). In fact, he is probably to the right of Bush on almost every issue I can think of, but not in a Buchanan or Browne or third party kind of way.
I agree fully ... except on taxation policy ...
Cheers,
Richard F.
At the time that Keyes and Kristol were at Harvard, nearly ALL serious, non anarcho-libertarian conservatives were Strauss fans, at least in part.
The ISI (Intercollegiate Studies Institute) funded summer seminars for young conservative intellectuals to learn from the leading conservative thinkers, and Strauss was just about the number one on the list of seminar leaders. There were numerous articles in National Review and Modern Age propounding Straussian concepts.
Your charges against Keyes amount to criticizing him for the year of his birth. Pretty silly.
And add to it that George Washington, among others, was strong on the social utility of religion. But unlike Washington, Keyes is a devout Roman Catholic.
Some posts here are really silly.
Cheers,
Richard F.
I had argued with Clarity in the past, and had been arguing and agreeing with him since his return, so your 'I miss him' startled me! But you are right, he is gone again!
What happenned, do you know? Did he leave an opus, or was he banned?
Keyes studied with the great Straussian, Allan Bloom, who once called him the sharpest student he ever taught.
But Keyes broke with the more sceptical East Coast Straussians decades ago, over the very matters mentioned here, among them the truth of the Christian Religion, and the dangers of merely attending to the social utility of religion. One consequence of this is that he argues much more forcefully on abortion than guys like Bill Kristol or Walter Berns, and another is that he admires Lincoln more wholeheartedly than Kristol or his father do. Of the great students of Strauss in current academic circles, Keyes is most like Harry Jaffa, though Jaffa is not Christian.
IMHO, Strauss remains a powerful, and on the whole, beneficial influence on Republican and American thought, but Keyes is way beyond being a "disciple." He is his own man, and must be judged as such.
Nice to see you so learned on these things, BTW!
Cheers,
Richard F.
Look at his comments in this article. Is there any doubt Keyes is an elitist? Only question I have about Keyes is if he is a esoteric Straussian and thinks principles are myths and nothing but useful constructs or an exoteric Straussian who believes truth and justice really or might exist. Observing his cult like hold on his followers inclines me to think he is the former.
Since I don't watch the show, and since you all do, I'll just have to take their interpretations of the show and assume he has seen the light.
And I am a committed Roman Catholic, and I, too, believe in the evident utility of religion in politics.
I think you have to be blind not to see it. Tocqueville is terrific on the subject, IMHO.
Nice, as always, to have your sane voice in these conversations.
Cheers,
Richard F.
Been there, done that. Don't you remember back when we would read his columns or speeches and we'd take offense at something he said, and you all would have to come on here time and again and tell us we were wrong and then explain to us what he really said?
Well, see, most of us don't have time for Remedial Keyes, so it's just much easier to take people's word for what he is doing, rather than wasting all that time misinterpreting his words.
It works great for me; lots of people I admire post what they think on these threads, so I just take their word for it.
pere, at least. I'd have to hunt the reference, but Jaffa gives him both barrels on it somewhere. Of course, they aren't lewrockwell nut types, but they make less of Lincoln, by far, than Keyes does. Or I do.
This thread starts, BTW, from a Lincoln hater site, and that is "no accident," as the Marxists say.
I would not say that I am learned, but I attended a number of ISI seminars, and got acquainted with Berns, Russell Kirk, and Mel Bradford, among many others. That reminds me, maybe we could start a thread for conservative intellectual concepts. If my fellow Hobbits and I can do it, certainly there is enough material for serious discussion in the area of conservative thinking?
OK with me, really.
So I take it you agree that Keyes has not, in these two months, used the show for "Bush bashing?"
May I quote you on that?
Cheers,
Richard F.
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