When A Conservative Supreme Court Is Not So Conservative
Written by admin on February 28, 2010 – 6:16 pm -
If there is one subject that gets everyone hot and bothered, it is the United States Supreme Court. The highest court in the land is the focus of so much attention because it has such far reaching power. The court has recently become much more conservative, but that may not mean what many conservatives really want.
The United States Supreme Court is the most powerful governmental agency in the United States. Well, maybe after the Federal Reserve! The reason for this is the Supreme Court can overrule any law and can dictate how things should be handled in legal issues. This ranges from whether alleged terrorists can be held at Guantanamo without legal recourse to whether major league baseball violates anti-trust laws. This power is all the more prevalent given the fact the Supreme Court justices serve for life or until they retire.
The great Supreme Court war is all about getting “your” justice on the court. Conservatives want conservative justices on the court. Liberals want liberal justices on the court. The fight tooth and nail to get them there, only to find that most justices don’t fit in a nice round whole once they get there. Many a conservative justice has become liberal and the recent appointment of Sotomayor is actually going to be a surprise to liberals as she has some very conservative views on certain subjects.
Perhaps the most ironic thing about these titles is they often do not carry the same meaning as they have in political discourse. The Court is turning conservative, so let’s take a look at that. One of the prime elements of conservative political views is government should be small. A conservative Supreme Court, however, does not take this view nor do they believe government should be large. Instead, a conservative Court is going to give the legislative [Congress] and executive [President] plenty of room to do whatever it wishes. As you’ve probably noticed recently, this leads to more government instead of less.
Admittedly, this twisted result is not always the case. A conservative Court will tend to view things as written in the Constitution. This means there will be no limits on guns and Miranda rights may be in trouble. The issue of abortion is always a hot one. The Court is unlikely to reverse it in one fell swoop, but will instead most likely chip away at the ruling over the years until the ultimate result is already apparent for everyone to see. That is, of course, unless a number of liberal justices are brought on board.
Thomas Ajava is with StLouisWrongfulDeathAttorney.com – your online resource for finding a St Louis wrongful death attorney to handle your case.
Tags: conservative, Court, Supreme
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What is Conservative and What is a Liberal?
Written by admin on February 28, 2010 – 6:00 pm -
Introduction
I used to carpool with an old, blind professor to the small college I attended and he use to tell me, paraphrasing Gore Vidal, that politics came from two words: poli, meaning many, and tics, meaning blood sucking vermin. Unfortunately his somewhat suspect etymology, while proving technically untenable, has turned out to be largely correct in principle.
In American politics, where power has become everything, ideology has become a bastard step-child. American politicians think more about how they can fool the masses or get around popular democracy to further their ends than they do about what they truly believe in, if they actually believe in anything.
Of course, it is not my intent to sweep every single politician under the bus with a broad brush, so it must be understood that I am speaking in general terms.
Two Major Ideologies: Liberal and Conservative
There are two major ideologies in American politics. Understanding these helps us understand each other politically and enables us to make sense of what at times seems senseless. These ideologies are labeled conservative and liberal. Although these terms have changed definitions over the years, I will use them as they are currently defined.
If you took a strip of paper that was blue on one end and gradually changed colors until it was red at the other end you would end up with a spectrum of colors. At some point toward the center of the strip you could get into a few arguments as to whether the color was red, purple, or blue. It is that way with the liberal and conservative ideologies, so I will be concentrating on the ends of the strip, so to speak, and not the middle.
Conservative vs. Liberal
At the core of it, Conservatives base their ideology on what they see as reason and logic and it is individualistic by nature, whereas a liberal’s ideology is based on emotion and ideals and is collective by nature. A liberal is interested in curing society’s ills by social engineering. A conservative is interested in curing society’s ills by individuals exercising their own choices to better themselves. Because of this, conservatives view centralized power with deep suspicion. Liberals on the other hand see centralized power as an opportunity to affect great change for good.
The Role of Government
Because of the fundamental differences in the way conservatives and liberals approach the solutions to society’s challenges, it should come as no surprise that they have radically different views on the role of government.
The Liberal View
A liberal wants the government deeply involved in our lives. It is often seen as a parent to us all—or the big tent. They believe that the government can force society to confront its ills and legislate and enforce the cures. A liberal point of view diminishes the individual’s responsibility and believes people are victims or victimizers. This point of view does not view individuals as having power to rise above their circumstances in large numbers and therefore a savior must be found to “level the playing field.”
They point to the example of the civil rights movement of the 1960′s. Without government intervention, they argue, the rights of minorities would never have been acknowledged nor would there be equal rights for all. In fact, the civil rights movement is the basis of the modern liberal’s political ideology, and proof that it is essentially correct.
This conviction motivates liberals to use all means available to impose their vision of goodness on the masses. If they can’t get the populous to support their agenda then they will get the courts to legislate it. This is because they firmly believe that their agenda is for the greater good of society.
Liberalism is naturally sympathetic with socialism and suspicious of individualism and even though it shares the same long-term goals as conservatism, its approach, as you can see, is radically different.
The Conservative View
Even though the conservatives share with liberals the desire for a better society, they differ sharply in what role the government should play. In a nut shell, conservatives view the role of government as “the less the better.” Since they see the combined strength and sufficiency of the individual as the only honest cure for society they believe that the role of government should be restricted to functions that support and protect individual liberty. They are very suspicious of government interference in individual rights, and they do not see differences in socioeconomic groups as a bad thing since, in their view, it is every individual’s right to change those circumstances by choice and action.
They view the government’s attempts at redistribution of wealth through its tax codes, its interference in commerce by regulations, and its welfare entitlements as enabling individuals to shirk responsibility for their own lives and rely on the government to take care of them. They reason that the more the government takes responsibility for his or her well being away from the individual, the weaker and more dependent society will become.
Who’s Right?
At this point in American politics the two ideologies have taken a back seat to power, but if they were brought to bear on our government which would be the best: Socialist Democracy, or an independent go-it-alone Capitalist Democracy? I would submit to you that the extremes of both ideologies are dangerous and would deepen problems in American society and that one, tempered with the other, might be the best ideology of all.
For example: if we have a struggling class in America, we could provide training opportunities for those who wanted to succeed and would put forth efforts on their own behalf instead of entitlement programs that accomplish nothing and consume copious amounts of money? Along with such programs would also come the responsibility for the recipients to put forth efforts on behalf of their own welfare.
We need to have a heart that includes tough love and foresight, one that looks at America’s opportunities and does not retreat into a defensive posture from the world around it. One that can realize the true nature of the threats against America and America’s way of life. Not a vision that feels good at the thought of America sinking down to the level of the third world, but instead one that forges on ahead and shows the way for the third world to follow.
America must continue to provide unparalleled opportunities, but not bend to whiners and self proclaimed victims who want to short-cut the system and reap benefits they never earned. We must in sympathy try to teach fishing, quit giving fish and realize that poverty is not always the rich or the government’s fault. But we must not march on, leaving people behind who, with a little instruction and help, can become productive and successful. In doing this we must also have the heart firm enough to leave those behind who refuse all help and demand instead to be fed from the public coffer’s without a contribution of their own.
We must leave classism, racism, and bigotry behind, regardless of whether it is the old school, hard-hearted variety of the wacky right, or the soft, feel-good, guilt-washing, variety of the wacky left. No class of Americans should be punished or be held back based on the color of their skin in order to “even the score.” We need to let go of power and take hold of responsibility; to quit giving the media oracle status, and get the job done.
I was born to itinerate teachers February 16, 1960 in a tiny town, in a clinic beside a grain elevator, in eastern Washington. From there our family moved every two years around the state until I was 6.
At the age of 6 my parents moved to Nigeria, West Africa, where we stayed until I was 12. We then moved to New York City. After two years there, we left for North Dakota. Finally after that, we moved to Maryland where I married the most beautiful bride and have been ever since.
I enjoy writing, making music, art, golf, and racquetball.
Sharing the house with me and my wife is our youngest daughter, although she is gone quite a bit now–sigh, two dogs, Billy and Calvin, and two cats, Elvis and Felina Turtle Bean. (Don’t ask.)
Tags: conservative, liberal
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Can a new political party be built solely on the rejection of both liberal and conservative ideology?
Written by admin on February 28, 2010 – 6:00 pm -There would be a lot of competing views, but there are already a lot of those in the existing parties anyway…at least this way there would be no “party line,” the candidates would represent a “wide range of centrist views”…or am I being too utopian?
Tags: both, built, conservative, ideology, liberal, Party, political, rejection, solely
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