Well it’s 5am* and I’m sitting at a Starbucks in Times Sq. working on term papers—what better time to blog?  Come to think of this, this is my last post for POL 213.  Hmmm.  I better get to my point before I get too nostalgic.

Somehow, I got to thinking about mission statements.  Every organizational body has a mission statement.  Even those without a stated mission have one, and its often one they would not themselves quickly assign. 

Companies have performance expectations.  Schools have educational goals.  Gangs have a territory to protect.

That led me to question, what, is the mission statement of the United States, and, consequently, what is the job of American statesmen? 

The Declaration clearly lays out what the Framers wanted America to become—a place where man’s inalienable rights are protected and nourished.  Fully achieving such a goal, however, is a pipe dream to say the least.  Perhaps in a utopia, yes, rights would be protected supremely, but the Constitution certainly does not accommodate this.

In the Federalist Papers, the writers make it clear that they are not looking to construct a perfect society, a desire reflected in the idea of a “more perfect union.”  The argument is made that, not only is the Constitution a flawed document—flaws rooted in man’s fallen reason—but that it is only the roadmap towards such a union.  Man’s inability to reach a utopia is, in fact, the reason a Constitution is needed, for “if men were angels no government would be necessary.”

The American way of life is one where citizens—sometimes chaotically, sometimes decidedly—define and redefine what it means to be an American.  Each morning, the sun rises on a new America. With each new law, the former America passes away.  America is not a static term, but is rather a work in progress, a work that will continue as long as America is America. 

The beliefs of the American people shape the nation’s character, and their hopes shape its future. 

America is moving.  Many conservatives decry such movement.  They shouldn’t.  America was created to be a nation in flux.  There is no common law or inordinate reverence of precedent.  Originalism is important, yes, but even originalists must remember that the make-or-break reason to look to the Constitution is because the Framers were largely right—the Framers weren’t right merely because they wrote the Constitution.

The measure of America’s greatness should be in relation to this perfect union—is America becoming a more or less perfect union?  Progress can be measured binarily—has America become more or less perfect—periodically—has America become more or less perfect in the past 100 hundred years—tenurely—has America become more or less perfect under the current Congress—and daily—is America more or less perfect today than it was yesterday.

It is hard to say what progress (or lack thereof) the United States has made over the past 220 years, as such a measure would require a lengthy discussion of standards.  Thinking about the Federalists, though, makes me a bit pessimistic.

Whereas statesmen such as Madison and Hamilton once held court in the realm of popular ideas, partisan-pimps and panic-profiteers now filibuster the congress of public opinion.  Do Americans care about ideas, or do they just enjoy being convinced?  Why are the populists drowning out the intuitive statesmen in the current election?  How in the world are Sean Hannity and Bill O’Rielly household names, while most people still ask, “Peggy who?”

I am still an undying American optimist.  I still believe in our “rendezvous with destiny.” 

If we have become a less perfect union, though, what will it take to correct the tide—a changing of the guard?  A civil revival?  If we have become a more perfect union, how can we become an even more more perfect union?

These are the questions with which American statesmen must wrestle, and only time and the American genius can answer.

*-Posted after the fact; I was too cheap to pay for WiFi at Starbucks.

Lt. Col. Brian Birdwell is an interesting man—a man of passion, integrity, ideas, and conviction, and most certainly a hero.  I met LTC Birdwell over the summer in Austin, TX. 

Birdwell came to the national attention in 2001 as the closest living survivor to the plane that struck the Pentagon on Sept. 11.  Following the attack, Birdwell, who had lost over 60% of this skin to the ensuing fire, required over thirty surgeries over an extended stay at the Washington Burn Center.  While there, he received a visit that became the subject of a “too good to be true” chain e-mail that turned out to be true.

Three days after the attack, President Bush paid a visit to the burn center.  After talking with Birdwell and his wife, Mel, for a short time, the President faced Birdwell—heavily bandaged and barely conscious—and saluted him.  In 15 seconds that no doubt played out like an eternity, Birdwell slowly returned his commander-in-chief’s salute as everyone in the room’s—the President and First Lady included—eyes filled with tears.  (It is interesting to note here that, out of respect, it is always the inferior soldier who initiates the salute, and holds it until his commanding officer retunes the gesture.)

Birdwell now speaks around the country on his expeience and view on the War on Terror. 

I recently heard Birdwell being interviewed on WallBuilders Live, during which he said something I’ve heard him say several times before: Casualties in war are not a measure of success or failure but a measure of cost. 

It seems like whenever I mention my support for the troops and their mission, someone has to bring up the body count.  “How can you support the war?  Almost four-thousand Americans have come home in bags in just five years!  How many more Americans need to die?”

I’ve always found this argument to be specious, but LTC Birdwell’s quote gives what I was feeling concision, authority, and timeliness.

We lost over 117,500 men in World War I.  We were involved for two years.

We lost over 418,500 men in World War II.  We were involved for four years.

We lost over 50,000 men in Korea.  We were involved for three years.

We lost close to 60,000 men in Vietnam, with many more still missing.  We were there for a decade.

In those four wars, we lost 58,750, 103,750, 18,000, and 6,000 men per year (respectively).

In each of these conflicts, we lost more men per year then we’ve lost during our entire time in Iraq.  Were these wars unjust too?  Okay maybe Vietnam was, and maybe even Korea, but what about World War II?  We were the victims of a provocative act of terror.  An entire race was being systematically eliminated.  Europe was slowly being taken over by despots and demagogues.  Was there more to the conflict than the body count?

418,000 servicemen killed in the line of duty over the course of four years—that’s about 300 a day. 

In our four-year engagement in the Second World War, we liberated a people and overthrew a dictator with imperialistic aspirations.  Its cost?  Close to 300 servicemen a day.

Don’t get me wrong, it was a tragedy, but does that make it unjust.  The casualty count in World War II was a gauge of the pervasive evil in the world and a measure of the fallen world we live in.

The same is true in Iraq.  There are a half dozen reasonable arguments for why the war is unjust—I don’t believe most of them, but they’re reasonable.  A body count is not one.

There has been a pronounced paradigm shift between the Federalists of the 18^th Century and the Federalists of today.  The former sought an energetic federal government with several hedges—divided power, popular sovereignty, and frequent elections, to name a few—to prevent tyranny.  The latter seem to think the Federal government should be a largely-impotent caretaker of the system they have been given, and that all issues which directly affect the people should be dealt with by the states and the states alone.  (Ironically, I’d say that the Federalists of now more closely resemble the Anti-Federalists of then.)  The battle over abortion presents a clear example of where modern Federalisms departs from Constitutional Federalism. 

Why didn’t the purely federal government work?  Because the states were incapable of preventing they tyranny of majority faction (Fed. 10).

What’s majority faction?  A majority of the populous “united and actuated by a common impulse of passion,” who are hostile to, or in the least indifferent to, the rights of the minority (Ibid.).

 How can we prevent majority faction?  By establishing a large republic that is “neither a national nor a federal [republic] but a composition of both” (Fed. 37, 39).

Now, let’s apply this check on majority faction to the abortion debate.  By leaving the decision up to the states, are the rights of a segment being disregarded by one of the prevailing faction*?  Necessarily, unless all 50 states agree on the right answer (which is improbability bordering on impossibility).  Either the fetus is alive and legalizing abortion is infringing on its rights—all of its rights, since every right promised by the Declaration and guaranteed in the Constitution is predicated upon life—or the fetus is not alive and proscribing abortion is infringing a woman’s right over her own body.

At the end of the day, abortion is not a states’ right issue but a human rights one.  Either a fetus is alive and an abortion is its state-sanctioned execution, or it is not alive, or not alive until a certain point, and outlawing the practice is an intrusive governmental foray into a woman’s health.  The new batch of conservative politicians who argue otherwise are either honestly ignorant as to the position they are defending or shamelessly marketing themselves to moderate Republicans.

*- I know abortion is a very complex issue and that there are vastly more than two sides.  For the sake of clarity, though, I’m limiting the discussion to the two encompassing parties: pro-life and pro-choice.

Two weeks ago, The King’s College hosted a debate between Dinesh D’Souza and Christopher Hitchens over the question, “Is Christianity the Problem?”  D’Souza, a former policy advisor to President Reagan and author of eleven books including his current New York Times bestseller What’s So Great About Christianity?, argued that, no, most if not all of the problems in our world and the atrocities throughout history, even if not explicitly carried out under the banner of atheism, have been the result of denying the existence of a god.  Hitchens, a prolific author and regular contributor to Slate Magazine, Vanity Fair, and Atlantic Monthly, defended the premise of his own recent NYT bestseller God is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything.  It would be almost as difficult to wrap up each polemics’ points and counter-points in a single blog post as it would be to completely defend or refute theism in a two-hour debate.  If you weren’t present, you can check out the debate in its entirety on the King’s website.  You can also catch D’Souza’s apperences, along with clips of the debate, on Fox & Friends and Hanity & Colmes.  There is one aspect of the debate, however, I will try to address.  

I wanted to wait off on replying to this topic until I had a chance to browse through D’Souza’s book.  He makes some valid arguments  that would further solidify a believer’s faith, but in both the debate and what I’ve read of his book, D’Souza leaves out the greatest part of Christianity: grace.  

You can’t fully understand our need or Christ’s sacrifice without delving into the theology of the issue.  While refusing to use Scripture may have perked the ears of some skeptics in the audience, D’Souza was conceding his greatest weapon.  Hitchens is right–on its face, the cross is ludicrous.  The Son of God coming as an obscure, itinerant preacher in an obscure corner of the Roman Empire, leading a seemingly-insignificant life, and dying a cruel and shameful death sounds ridiculous, and in many ways it is.  It is not until you look at the grotesqueness of our sins and God’s need for justice do you see why we must submit to this “divine tyrant,” and why it was so loving that God only waited as long as He did to intervene.  It is not until you see the divine plan of salvation weaved through the first epoch of human history do you recognize the beauty in the nuances of the Gospel story.  It is not until you examine the effects of this insignificant life on the past two millennia do you find the exceptionalism in Chrstianity.  

You can’t effectively defend Christianity by arguing body counts–if you believe, as Christian orthodoxy teaches, that every life holds infinite worth, you can’t debate justice in terms of who’s tyrants have killed less people.  You can’t defend Christianity by comparing charitable donations–any member of any faith can exhibit altruism for any number of selfish or selfless reasons.  And, most of all, you cannot defend Christianity by ignoring its exceptional doctrine–grace.    

This doesn’t mean we shouldn’t appeal to secular authorities in defending the faith, but the message still needs to be there.  Augment the gospel of grace with science, history, and comparative analysis, but don’t make the accidents the essential element.  What’s so great about Christianity?  I’m a sinner saved by grace, heir to a gift I could never earn nor deserve, freed from bondage to enjoy God more fully.

How is this logical at all??? I respect Dr. Dobson, but he couldn’t be more wrong. I don’t know what happened to him, and honestly, its sad. He’s become a painful ideologue out of touch with reality who is being completely irresponsible with the great power he has.

When Dr. Dobson speaks, people listen. He should be a uniter, not a divider. He shouldn’t be voting in the negative and announcing it in the NYT. If he wants to support Mike Huckabee (who I suspect he will eventually support), that’s fine by me. I think he should support Huckabee if that’s where his heart is. Rather than saying who has it wrong, why not tell us who has it right and try and further the ideals you share? That’s what the party needs.Dr. Dobson made a few other comments in an interview with Sean Hannity I feel impelled to comment on:

• “You’re taking Rudy’s word on his intention to appoint strict constructionists to the Supreme Court”–You have Rudy’s word that he will appoint Constructionists and some sketchy deduction telling you he’s untrustworthy versus Hillary’s adamant word that she will appoint Harry Blackmun 2.0. Hmmm still gotta choose the former.
• “You’ve got a few issues that you base this on, but I just don’t agree with them”–I didn’t catch the whole quote and didn’t care enough to go back and rewatch it, but he basically said Hannity was taking a few issues and making his case while he, Dr. D, was looking at the whole range of issues and making an informed decision. Forgive me, but I only heard Dr. Dobson talk about maybe 3 or 4 issues, while I heard Sean Hannity go across the political spectrum and admit the top-3′s weaknesses while extolling their strengths. I think Dr. Dobson was playing role reversal there.
• “There are many, many ways that a president can influence [the abortion policy]“–Reagan was the most articulate proponent of the pro-life cause ever to sit in the Oval Office, maybe to ever open his mouth. He commanded the bully pulpit like no one before or after him. “Abortion and the National Conscience” is one of the greatest op-eds of the past 30 years. Yet Reagan couldn’t bring down abortion without a Constructionist court. Yes, the president can work behind the scenes to bring abortion down, but he needs to get the right people on the bench. Then, and only then, can the president really help bring down that infernal decision.
• “You’re assuming that the election is going to be tomorrow. It is 13 months away. Things change.”–Yes, the election seems far off and in some ways is. A new candidate could pop in from stage right and save the day. Maybe, hopefully, let’s pray for it. But does that mean we don’t prepare for worse? Let’s look at it another way. From listening to Dobson’s teachings, I know that he believes that Jesus will return for his followers one day like a thief in the night, meaning that there’s a chance Dobson will never die. He believes it, as do I. But, forgive the speculation, but there’s not a lot I wouldn’t bet to say that Dobson also holds a life insurance policy and a will. But if Jesus could come back before his death, why take out a life insurance policy? Isn’t that what we really want? Why write a will? Is he a hypocrite? Has he compromised his conviction? Of course not, he’s just having a plan if things don’t go the way he hoped. That plan may have cost him something (his monthly premiums), but its better than leaving his loved ones with piles of debt and confusion.

We’re talking about the life of our country and our unborn children. He may think that a Rudy presidency will stop the right from fighting abortion (which is ridiculous), but making this stand will only push the day Roe falls out of his lifetime and maybe out of ours. If Hillary is elected, the 1-3 SC judges who will be replaced in the next four years will be as young as they are progressive. How long will they be on the bench–15, 20, 25 years? We’ll lose any ground we gained with Alito and Roberts and then some. How many millions of babies will die because of this? Maybe a better option will present itself. But that doesn’t mean we don’t take out a life insurance policy–planning in supporting the best man (or woman) for the job who shares most of our values who stands a chance in November. One stat from that interview says it all:

Hillary- 48%  

Rudy- 30%

Dobson-supported third candidate- 14%

Where’s the logic in this? Where’s the common sense in giving the election to a woman who will nominate a justice who will do everything short of opening a Planned Parenthood in their office, who will be sitting on the bench for upwards of 20 years, to propagate the pro-life cause?That’s the slow and painful death of the pro-life movement, and there’s nothing logical about that.

• Gym Membership

We all pay for the gym regardless of whether or not we decide to work out. This used to be presumptuous back when everyone had a membership to Crunch; now that only some of us actually get gym memberships with NYHRC, this policy borders on Socialism. Student Services’s rationale seems to be, “Well, if we didn’t subsidize the cost of memberships, very few of our students would have the means to secure one for themselves.” Hmmm now what if very few of us could afford health insurance?   

• Utilities

Room A and Room B are situated side-by-side on one of The Vogue’s upper floors. The students in Room A make a conscious effort to be conservative with their utilities. They never use more than one light in a room and always turn it off before they leave that room, take five-minute showers, and don’t use the heat when an old hoodie or blanket would do the trick. Next door in Room B, however, the students use their utilities like someone else is paying for them (since, well, somebody else is). Student B.1 keeps the thermostat at an arctic 66º at all times; Student B.2 falls asleep with the TV on five nights a week; Student B.3 steams his business-casual attire in the bathroom every morning after his shower; and Student B.4 feels most comfortable studying when the lighting in his room resembles a tanning salon. Now, common sense would tell you that Room A’s annual utility bill would be roughly the same as Room B’s monthly bill…but no. The students in Rooms A & B pay exactly the same. Sure, its less paperwork for both the students and for residence life, but that doesn’t make it right.   

Of course, I am the one who leaves the door open with the A/C on…

Lost in all the hype of HillaryCare 2.0—Senator Clinton’s proposed $110 billion annual socialized healthcare plan—is the equally-neophylic tax plan proposed by fellow presidential hopeful Barack Obama. The first aspect of Senator Obama’s plan is painful predictable: let’s spit in the face of the Laffer Curve, cut taxes for the middle class and elderly, and increase taxes on the rich (they have money to go around, no?). On top of that, as opposed to doing the responsible thing—such as cutting government spending and closing redundant programs and agencies—Senator Obama, according to the New York Times, plans to “raise capital gains taxes on the wealthy [...] and abolish tax breaks that have saved hedge fund and private equity managers billions of dollars.”

Here’s my question to the Senator. You posit yourself as an advocate of the poor, unemployed, disenfranchised, and, basically, every non-C-level worker in the United States. You hope to lower taxes for the poor (an admirable goal indeed) and bring unemployment back to a healthy rate (which, again, would be excellent), but then you propose increasing capital gains taxes? Where are these unemployed and unskilled workers going to find work if those industries employment is dependent upon are discourage from investing and growing?

The Times quotes Senator Obama as saying, “If you talk about this in polite company, sooner or later you’ll get accused of waging class warfare, as if it’s distasteful to point out that some C.E.O.’s make more in 10 minutes than a worker makes in 10 months.” In a world of terror and uncertainty facing a possible recession, is this really that big of a problem (if it’s a problem of all)?

–PS- Senator Obama will be in Manhattan Thursday for a rally. As you may be able to tell from this post, I am less than a fan of Obama, but I highly encourage checking him out regardless of where you stand on ’08. I’d be there, but that’s the premier of The Office, and I kinda got a thing for Pam

In this article, Stossel hits many of these normal points while coming back to his simple, unstated thesis: life in the welfare state sucks! It sucks to have to wait four months for a hospital visit. It sucks when your dog can get an X-ray months quicker than you can. It sucks when you have to leave the country for life-or-death surgeries your government has deemed “elective.”  Sure, healthcare needs to be fixed, but let’s not throw the baby out with the bathwater!

I highly encourage you to read what Stossel has to say on the topic. He says it more eloquently, convincingly, and succinctly than I could ever hope to put it.

Mike Huckabee, and for this I [heart] Huckabee, shot back that history will judge whether we were right to go in, but for now, “we’re there.” He echoed Colin Powell: We broke it, now we own it. “Congressman, we are one nation. We can’t be divided. . . . If we make a mistake, we make it as a single country, the United States of America, not the divided states of America.” David Brody of the Christian Broadcasting Network says he doesn’t know why Mr. Huckabee isn’t in the top tier. I wonder too. Maybe he is and we don’t know it.  

I found the whole “Crack a joke at Sen. Thompson’s expense” part unnecessary and a bit demeaning to the office, but entertaining nonetheless. What really stuck out to me though was what seemed like Mayor Giuliani’s silent campaign for his opponent, Fmr. Gov. Romney.

In the hours leading into the debate, much was made about the imminent clash between Giuliani and Romney over border security, immigration, and “sanctuary cities.” Mayor Giuliani clearly has the stronger track record and plan on these issues, and many I spoke with prior to the debate were anxiously waiting to see the hole Rudy would tear for Mitt. But then…nothing. Giuliani certainly came out on top in the exchange, but he went quite easy on the fact that there were three official sanctuary cities in Massachusetts and the Governor’s lack of a border plan. There was enough on Rudy’s website and YouTube channel to completely discredit the Governor, but alas, nothing.

What really drew my attention to this was in Mayor Giuliani’s opening statement (FF to 7:20), where he said:

I think [this nomination's] going to come down to experience. This is not a time that the United States should be electing someone who’s gonna to get on-the-job training. You need people with executive experience, and my real concern is, you’ll have three leading Democratic candidates, none of which have ever run a city, a state or a business. [...] America’s at war. America’s got some big problems. It’s not the time for on-the-job training as an executive.  

This quote is an explicit attack on Democratic candidates, Senators Clinton and Obama and Fmr. Senator Edwards, none of whom have held an executive role in the public or private sector. Twenty-four hours removed from the debate, however, I can’t help but see an implicit attack against the entire GOP field save for himself, Fmr. Governor Huckabee, and the successful CEO Governor Romney. While it’s true that Clinton, Obama, and Edwards all lack political executive experience, so do Senators McCain, Thompson, and Brownback, and Congressmen Paul, Hunter, and Tancredo. Did the Mayor not just implicitly break Ronald Reagan’s 11th Commandment: “Thou shalt not talk ill of a former Republican?”

Whether or not Giuliani is consciously trying to bring the nomination down to he and Romney, it does bring up an interesting question: who would Rudy most want to run against?It’s no great secret that the GOP race is a three-person race: Mayor Giuliani, Senator McCain, and the last “Christian” Conservative left standing. Mayor Giuliani’s success or failure in this primary will largely be based on his ability to convince the Christian right–the traditional bread and butter of the GOP–to vote for him. Of that group–predominately comprised of Thompson, Romney, and Huckabee–who does the Mayor stand the greatest chance of beating? The answer is clearly Romney.While Romney has proven to be a juggernaut in the world of fundraising, he is riddled (to different extents) by the same problems which will preclude many evangelicals from voting for Rudy. Allow a few examples:

• Rudy is Catholic; Romney is Mormon.
• Rudy is pro-choice; Romney is a recent pro-life convert.
• Rudy is percieved as anti-second Amendment; Romney hosed the gun rights lobby while Governor.
• Rudy is pro-civil unions; Romney was Governor of the first and only state to legalize same-sex marriage.
• Rudy is seen as untrustworthy in relation to appointing constructionist judges; Romney is seen as all-around shiftless.

Maybe its my inner conspiracy theorist itching to get out, but it seems as though Rudy is purposefully restraining himself in these early debates from burying Romney in order to force the mid- to late-Bible belt primaries to choose between a nominal Catholic and an avowed Mormon.Not gonna lie, “I’m not even mad, I’m impressed…”