- I've always been competitive but never ambitious, but
were I ambitious, I would feel that I had at last arrived. Some letter
writer, basking in the reflected glory of George Bush's re-election, included
me in a list of what he called "limousine liberals."
-
- He couldn't be more wrong. I am a blue-collar working
guy. Some journalists have pretensions of being professionals, but we are
really just a bunch of Joe Lunch Buckets working in an information factory.
And I am not a liberal.
-
- His mistake was in his apparent definition of "conservative,"
which he seems to think is somebody who is in favor of foreign wars and
against gay marriage and abortion. That is a definition of conservative
straight out of the "How to Dupe the Dumb Masses" manual used
by professional campaign managers like Karl Rove.
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- So, let me explain what a conservative is. A conservative
believes that not only should the Supreme Court strictly construe the Constitution,
but so should the president, the House, the Senate, governors, mayors and
everybody else. A conservative does not approve of wars, except in defense
of the land and the people, and only upon a declaration of war by both
houses of Congress. A war to liberate somebody else from a nasty government
is unconstitutional, illegal and immoral.
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- To strictly construe the Constitution is to recognize
that it is not a "living document" to be amended by interpretation,
but rather is a contract between the states and the federal government.
To be properly construed, it must be read in the context of the times in
which it was written and adopted.
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- A conservative is against foreign aid. Nowhere in the
Constitution is Congress authorized to tax the American people and then
hand their money to a foreign government as either a gift or a loan. Nowhere
in the Constitution is the federal government authorized to provide welfare,
health care, housing or education. Nowhere in the Constitution does it
mention abortion or gay marriage. Nowhere in the Constitution is the federal
government authorized to subsidize either individuals or corporations.
-
- Philosophical and moral issues are to be decided by the
legislatures of the states, not by federal courts or even by Congress,
whose duties and powers are strictly limited by the Constitution. Whether
homosexuals should be allowed to marry or form civil unions and whether
abortion should be legal or illegal are both questions to be decided by
the state legislatures. No state or federal judge should have a say in
the matter, and Congress likewise has no authority to intervene one way
or the other.
-
- A conservative Christian believes that his own soul is
not imperiled if other people down the street decide to do some sinning.
A conservative Christian recognizes that he is commanded to feed the hungry,
clothe the naked and comfort the sick and dying. He is not commanded to
shift this responsibility to government. He is not commanded to judge other
people's lives and to regulate their behavior. A conservative Christian
recognizes that something does not have to be illegal in order for him
to refrain from doing it.
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- A conservative believes in the real, traditional values
of this country: courage, hard work, self-reliance, frugality, chastity
before marriage, faithfulness after marriage, loyalty to family and loyalty
to the Constitution. Loyalty to a political party or to a politician is
profoundly un-American.
-
- Now, it should be noted that the republic handed to us
by our Founding Fathers died with the Confederate States of America. That's
what that war was about. Since then, we have had a centralized national
government ever increasing its powers, and an imperialistic foreign policy.
People in Washington pay lip service, if that, to the Constitution, and
people outside of Washington don't seem to care.
-
- As for traditional values, they are little observed.
America is a decadent country, especially its cultural elite. One would
have to be deaf, blind and living in a monastery not to recognize this.
A true conservative has no place in either major party. They are both committed
to a centralized government at home and imperialism abroad. One's only
choice on Election Day is to try to pick the more competent of two candidates.
-
- So there. I am not a limousine liberal. I am a homeless
conservative living in an empire.
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- First published December 1, 2004
- http://www.lewrockwell.com/reese/reese-contact.html
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-
- Comment
- Alfred Lehmberg
- AlienView.net
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- By and large, this "yellow-dog" liberal of
the first water stands arm in arm with Charley Reese.
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