Pravda On The Constitution

I’m sure by now most of you have seen this article from Monday on the Constitution

‘We the People’ Loses Appeal With People Around the World

WASHINGTON — The Constitution has seen better days.

Aside from the irony that the writer plainly misses given the current Administration’s actions the one thing that really sticks in my craw after reading this is this line

The United States Constitution is terse and old, and it guarantees relatively few rights.

The main point of our Constitution is not to “guarantee” specific rights: it is to limit the reach of the Government to ensure our rights.

And the Left has never forgiven the Founders for this.

Update: And this brings me back the draft of a post I wrote several months ago but never finished:

Here’s our President on the Constitution

But, the Supreme Court never ventured into the issues of redistribution of wealth, and of more basic issues such as political and economic justice in society. To that extent, as radical as I think people try to characterize the Warren Court, it wasnt that radical. It didnt break free from the essential constraints that were placed by the founding fathers in the Constitution, at least as its been interpreted and Warren Court interpreted in the same way, that generally the Constitution is a charter of negative liberties. Says what the states cant do to you. Says what the Federal government cant do to you, but doesnt say what the Federal government or State government must do on your behalf, and that hasnt shifted and one of the, I think, tragedies of the civil rights movement was, um, because the civil rights movement became so court focused I think there was a tendancy to lose track of the political and community organizing and activities on the ground that are able to put together the actual coalition of powers through which you bring about redistributive change. In some ways we still suffer from that.

This is not some mindless rant by a starry-eyed high school or college student. He was 40 years old and had already been a member of the Illinois Senate for several years.

That’s his view; that’s their view. The Constitution is the impediment to their plans to make our lives more better.

Really.

Trust them.

5 Responses to “Pravda On The Constitution”

1. tree hugging sister says:

   February 8, 2012 at 9:45 am

   That “Freedom of the Press” thingee sure comes in handy when they want to bitch.

2. Skyler says:

   February 8, 2012 at 10:55 am

   Did you read what our Supreme Court resident hag Justice Ginsberg said about our Constitution recently? Unbelievable. She advised another country, I forget which one, to not use our Constitution as a model because it’s so old fashioned.

   oh, here’s

   the article.

3. ricki says:

   February 8, 2012 at 11:16 am

   I heard that. I guess I’m exactly 180 of Justice Ginsberg; if I were advising a country trying to forge a new constitution I’d point out ours as a model…because it’s worked pretty damn well for over 230 years.

4. aelfheld says:

   February 8, 2012 at 1:27 pm

   Trust them?

   Not on your life.

5. nightfly says:

   February 8, 2012 at 5:23 pm

   I feel like Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn when they watch Injun Joe swear on the Bible to tell the truth and then perjure himself by lying about who killed the Doc. They take it that anyone who could could lie like that after swearing on a Bible without bursting into flames had sold his soul to the Devil.

   I won’t go that far with our President, but he is looking remarkably fit for a man who laid his hand on a Bible and swore to uphold and defend the Constitution of the United States…