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If We Can Keep It
About 235 years ago a deal was struck in Philadelphia. It was a compromise, an attempt to balance the sometimes conflicting interests of a sprawling new world.
Upon the conclusion of negotiations, Benjamin Franklin said of America’s not-yet-ratified Constitution:
“I confess that there are several parts of this Constitution which I do not at present approve, but I am not sure I shall never approve them.” Yet Franklin was astonished that the Constitution, despite its various concessions and compromises, was a document “approaching so near to perfection” as it did.
Franklin understood that, despite differences of opinion even on significant matters, people could share a common goal sufficiently worthy to compel them to make sacrifices in pursuit of their common interests.
We are in a kind of revolution today. The founding principles of free speech, individual liberty, limited government, due process, and rule of law are all under assault from a grasping and relentless progressive left that would abandon our nation’s very framework if it advanced their radical agenda. All that holds them in check is the fear that they will push too fast and too far, overplay their hand, and awaken resistance.
Conservatives — those of us who cherish the nation born in Philadelphia and bequeathed to us through the sweat and blood and striving of our ancestors — should take a lesson from the hard-headed realists of the Constitutional Convention. We have to unite around our common interests, around that free speech, individual liberty, limited government, due process, and rule of law, and work with people who may not agree with us in every particular, but who do agree that those things are essential and non-negotiable.
Other things, we can fix.
We speak of “infrastructure bills,” but that’s just concrete and cable and so much cronyism. America’s infrastructure is an idea, an idea of the relationship between the citizen and the state. That, more than any bridge or railway or pipeline or digital superhighway, must be maintained and preserved.
Everyone who shares that view should join together, acknowledging but agreeing to overlook other disagreements so long as the preservation of that system of government of, for, and by the people is preserved. The rest we can debate in the public square, and reach whatever agreements are possible in a large and diverse population.
It’s time to take this seriously, and to set aside differences that don’t rise to the level of safeguarding the work done more than two centuries ago by the men who shaped the greatest nation on Earth.
Published in General
The Communists have won.
https://www.realvision.com/shows/mike-green-in-conversation/videos/is-the-golden-age-of-liberal-capitalism-over?source_collection=b8bd9d62c77143f7a39513e85d310b11
You can get the transcript for a dollar if you give them your name.
I keep telling you guys, we The whole West did every single thing wrong in the face of the wage deflation and job destruction from automation and global labor. It stole peoples agency and it favored capital over people. The way this guy describes it even worse than I thought.
The right has never been very serious about any of this, so now everybody is going to pay.
So you surrender. Fine. Go away.
In case you haven’t figured it out, fiscal policies means communism. lol
Here is the other article I keep posting. Voting plus discretionary central banking equals doom.
http://financialrepressionauthority.com/2017/07/26/the-roundtable-insight-george-bragues-on-how-the-financial-markets-are-influenced-by-politics/
Get the transcript and then tell me what to do.
If you get the transcript or watch the video, be sure to watch the long interview of David Stockman. It’s the 90 minute one.
And Mickey and Judy will put on a show in their own backyard with all the neighborhood kids.
Let’s have a dose of reality, shall we? The DOJ, FBI, NSA, CIA, and DHS are thoroughly corrupt. The top-level officers and managers who run these agencies are corrupt and happy to not simply spy on Americans but label law abiding citizens as domestic terrorists. Many of the senior officers in the Pentagon need to be court-martialed for gross incompetence and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs is happy to commit treason by informing an enemy combatant of our intentions before we act. He is lauded by the leftist news media and the White House as heroic. The US military is following the orders of a dishonest and deceitful president and violating standing federal immigration law to transport and relocate tens of thousands of illegal aliens around the country…and Congress and the courts do nothing.
The major tech firms that own and control virtually all of social media are also militant socialists who think nothing of destroying a subscriber’s career without giving subscribers a way to defend themselves. Banks are shutting down accounts for customers who speak openly against woke groups or agendas. Schools and universities across the nation are Marxist brainwashing centers and have been for decades. So-call reputed scientists and medical professionals lie about medications and therapies that can treat COVID and the honest medical professionals who do speak up are cancelled. Woke activists have taken up positions and control corporate HR departments so employees who are still lucky enough to be employed are frightened to say anything that runs counter to the woke agenda.
The IRS will soon have upwards of 80,000 new agents so the agency can monitor your private bank transactions starting at $600. But once the IRS has the ability to view your bank activities, you think that a $600 transaction threshold will be respected? Where is the outrage on this initiative? The news media doesn’t give a damn. They’re in lockstep with the Democrats. A good portion of the national news media were former officials in Democrat and Republican administrations.
District attorneys are releasing felons and not bothering to arrest or incarcerate shoplifters and looters. Meanwhile, people who happened to be in the general vicinity of the US Capitol building on January 6th are still being hunted down and arrested. Have an idea that the 2020 presidential election was stolen? What are you – a conspiracy nutcase? How can you believe that lie? You may have to be watched closely.
But let’s have a dialogue with neighbors about freedom and the republic. Should we invite the FBI?
My three youngest kids participated in high school sports, pretty much everything: football, basketball, soccer, softball, baseball, tennis, track. Ours was a tiny little Catholic school, too small to field a strong team in most sports. We lost a lot of games, though we had some strong seasons and surprising wins.
One thing I love about the kids, about our little school, about my children, and most recently about my young cousin Grace, is that no matter how many goals they are down, no matter how late in the game, they play as if they can still win.
Never surrender. And if you must, do it somewhere else.
We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender, and even if, which I do not for a moment believe, this island or a large part of it were subjugated and starving, then our Empire beyond the seas, armed and guarded by the British fleet, would carry on the struggle, until, in God’s good time, the New World, with all its power and might, steps forth to the rescue and the liberation of the old. — Winston Churchill
Because Ricochet, where those who challenged the fraudulent results of the 2020 election, were condescendingly treated as conspiracy theorists, is the one place on the Internet that will ultimately prove to be the site where the socialist juggernaut will finally be stopped. Yeah, okay. Good luck with that. What does Joe Scarborough think?
Ok, now that I have had a dose of reality, what do you think we should do?
In a related issue, I created a post a few weeks ago about who are these protestors on the left, and what should be also considered is where are the equivalent protestors on the right? Brian, you mock the idea of conservative protestors, and rightly so. They don’t exist, and where they do attempt to assemble, they are infiltrated and perverted by the FBI, ATF, and all the other corrupt alphabet agencies.
We are the enemy in the eyes and hearts of the liberal, socialist, marxist government, maybe we should start acting more like we understand that.
I guess it’s not a very good post if you have to explain it. But I’ll explain it.
The post actually had a really specific point to it. It isn’t a generic rah rah thing exhorting conservatives to just go out there and win. Rather, it’s a specific recommendation that conservatives start putting aside relatively minor differences and pull together and work with each other, so that we can win more elections and start directing the country in a more promising direction.
That’s all it is.
Henry was asking for something practical versus what I was saying. This is what I think. Somebody like Chris Christie needs to get schooled on that stuff. He is a pretty good candidate in most ways. The other thing is, I don’t understand at all, but I think Steve Bannon is right about most things. He had a great speech about the financial markets, the fed, international trade, and so forth with the Manhattan Republican group. It’s not up anymore for some reason. That stuff is so hard to fix now.
School boards, city and county elections.
On #14 I showed that speech to a guy that was a hell of a lot smarter than me. A professional investor from way back. He said it was a good speech, too.
Brian, this is an incorrect characterization of the proposal, with respect to the proposed new rules on reporting of bank transactions. (I don’t know if you’re correct about the number of agents.)
The proposal is not to monitor all transactions. It is to require banks to report two total numbers each year for each bank account — the total amount deposited, and the total amount withdrawn. It is not about individual transactions.
Hank, great post. I have a concern, or maybe just a follow-up, on one part. You wrote:
I don’t know if we can treat the things that you list as non-negotiable.
I’m more inclined to agree that free speech, due process, and rule of law are non-negotiable in principle, though the devil’s in the details, so there might have to be compromise in practice. As a couple of examples: (1) I think that free speech is consistent with many reasonable regulations on such speech — defamation, fraud, actual extortion, and some time-place-manner restrictions; (2) I think that due process is non-negotiable, but we might disagree about what it entails — e.g. you might think that the government should be required to bring a lawsuit for a civil asset forfeiture, while I might think that it’s acceptable for the seizure to occur administratively, as long as the affected individual has a right to bring a lawsuit and, in such a suit, the burden of proof would remain on the government by a preponderance of the evidence.
I find it more difficult to agree that individual liberty and limited government are non-negotiable in principle. I don’t support a liberty uber alles approach, and different liberty interests merit different treatment. Your liberty to have a gun, or send your kids to the school of your choice, are very important. Your liberty to drive on the left side of the road is not. Similarly, on the limited government issue, I would not agree that all expansions of government power, or continuation of current government power, are necessarily wrong.
It’s complicated, in my view. By declaring certain things to be non-negotiable, you are necessarily undermining our ability to make the practical compromises that you also advocate.
I also realize that I may merely be raising an issue of insufficient elaboration on your part, and that you are assuming that there would be exceptions like those that I outlined. You need to be able to present a general program, and I’m in strong accord with your general program, and there’s limited space. When you say that you support “free speech” as non-negotiable, you shouldn’t have to provide all of the details and exception that would be presented in a semester-long First Amendment course.
I believe you are incorrect but your confidence in the altruistic intent of the Democrat Party and that this proposed legislation is relatively benign is duly noted. From Congressman Drew Ferguson (emphasis from his website):
So, it’s really directed to folks like Liz Cheney, Adam Kinzinger, and Mona Charen and not necessarily the majority of members here on Ricochet who already agree with the sentiment?
I don’t mock the idea of conservative protesters. Conservative protests are fine. Raising one’s voice at a school board meeting or city council meeting should happen. As you note, the risk-to-reward ratio is different for conservative protesters versus leftist protesters because of the subversion of our institutions. So, that should be front of mind to anyone before launching into any protest or any massive show of civil disobedience.
My objection was with the characterization that those in the GOP and the sympathetic GOP, Independent and even concerned Democrat electorate are quibbling about little things. The demonization of the former president and anyone associated with his administration is not a little thing. The castigation of anyone who questions the integrity of the 2020 election is not a little thing. The incarceration and treatment of January 6th protesters is not a little thing. But it’s okay, at least here on Ricochet we’re all agreed that Trump should have been impeached and never allowed to serve in government again and that he should be metaphorically tossed on an open fire to purify the GOP moving forward. But I quibble.
Brian, I think that you’re incorrect, but it’s not your fault. I think that that FoxNews segment that you linked is simply fake news. I think that they are incorrect, either lying (if they know the truth) or engaging in negligent misrepresentation (if they haven’t bothered to learn the truth). I only watched the opening moments, because the falsehood was, quite literally, in the first sentence.
This is so troubling and frustrating. I’ve thought that such misleading, and sometimes outright false, reporting has been pretty common on the Left for many years. My own impression is that I’m seeing it more and more on the Right. I’ve lost confidence in just about every news outlet.
I could point you to a fact-check, like this one from USA Today, which concludes:
You could respond by saying that you don’t trust USA Today. Fair enough. I don’t trust them either. But this doesn’t resolve the underlying question.
Here is the actual Treasury Department report of the proposal. It’s 24 pages long. The relevant paragraph is on page 19, and it says (emphasis added):
Here is a YouTube video of Treasury Sec. Yellen explaining this, in Senate testimony:
[I’ve clipped this one to start with Sec. Yellen’s statement. You can back it up to see the questioning/grandstanding by the Senator at issue, who appears to have the same mistaken impression of the proposal as the FoxNews guy in the clip that you provided, Brian.]
So we have the written proposal from the Treasury Department saying what I assert, and the sworn testimony of the Treasury Secretary saying the same thing.
@henryracette I like the spirit of your post and wouldn’t necessarily agree with it lock, stock and barrel, but then you covered that too.
https://www.aba.com/advocacy/policy-analysis/coalition-letter-to-the-house-opposition-to-tax-information-reporting-proposal
Jerry, I’m not saying that we have to agree on the details. What seems essential to me is that we agree, in principle, that these are critical things that conservatives can unite around, even if we might have differences of opinion about one or another aspect.
So, for example, if we get a fellow who believes that pornography should be illegal, and another who disagrees, they can both broadly support the principle of free speech even as they negotiate that point. In contrast, the new left sees speech as violence, arbitrarily censors content based on their opinions about its truth or usefulness, and considers silencing opposing viewpoints as an act of civic virtue.
Yes, we’ll argue amongst ourselves about the proper scope of government. But those who subscribe to the idea of limited government we will never call for essentially unlimited government, and will not try to sweep away the checks and balances the Founders established to keep government constrained.
Brian, I honestly don’t know what the majority of members here on Ricochet think about compromise within our movement and our party. I know that you can toss out a name — Cruz, Rubio, McConnell … Trump — and get pretty emphatic blowback of the I-will-never-support-him variety. And you can find plenty of commentary about the two parties being “just the same,” nonsense like that.
Some people may claim to support those values I mentioned above but act in ways that betray that support. Bill Kristol is only the most obvious example: I think he actually is a conservative we can do without. But he’s an extreme case; most less-than-perfect conservatives aren’t that unreliable.
Anyway, to answer your question: no, I wrote it for Ricochet, and for all those conservatives who are too quick to condemn fellow conservatives for their imperfections.
Then you are dead to me, you Soros-loving commie squish.Thank you, LNT. I appreciate the comment.
https://gop-waysandmeans.house.gov/fact-check-bidens-supercharged-irs-includes-bank-reporting-hardships-for-taxpayers/
https://www.kentucky.com/opinion/op-ed/article254779737.html
https://www.fibt.com/livefirst/news/customer-alert-on-irs-reporting-proposal/
https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/joe-bidens-permanent-irs-audit/
https://www.alec.org/article/taxing-times-in-washington-what-every-state-legislator-needs-to-know/
https://www.bankofthepacific.com/customer-support/quick-tips/consumer-new-irs-reporting-proposal/
The problem with your post, IMHO, is the vagueness about the minor matters we are quibbling about. Thus, the takeaway is simply, “Can’t we all just get along for the good of the republic?” You’ve written better.
I’m sure some will read it that way, Brian. Others will pick up on the idea that the Founders made hard compromises in order to create a functional society based on a core set of shared values, and will perhaps agree with me that we have to be better about compromising within our own movement and party on matters that don’t rise to the level of those core values, so that we can build a winning coalition that does share those core values.
Such as? You’re only proving my point about the vagueness of your post.