Something on the other Scooter
tacnukesoul recently made a good post on the whole Scooter Libby commutation, which is here, s'go read it. I was going to post what follows as a reply to that, but decided against as I was doing an awful lot of pontificating, and doing that in someone else's journal is vaguely rude.
First of all, I'm very chagrined that I am now no longer the only Scooter in politics. Sure, Libby is still criminally guilty, but he'll have a nice cushy office at the Cato or AEI in about...oh, what time is it now? And meanwhile I'll be taking myself out of a job with the Green Party. (Scooters tend to fare badly in news stories. I've never really made any, as five hundred thousand Greens nationwide are easily ignored by the MSM...besides Libby, the only Scooters that have made the news are Scooter Herring, in a 1970s drug bust trial that involved Cher and the Allman Brothers, and Scooter McCray, a short-lived basketball player who didn't quite make the transition from college to the pros.)
Anyway, tacnukesoul quotes George Mason in pointing out the problem with Bush letting Libby off the hook. Along with Patrick Henry, Mason was probably the most ardent anti-Federalist out there - not that he didn't like the idea of Federalism, but he was certainly opposed to the Constitution.
The Constitution has been kept in the form it's in for as long as it has not because it is a great document. It is exceptionally well-crafted, but is in many ways outmoded and ill-fitting a society of the Twenty-First Century. The reason why it is not updated is because of the small minds in power who would presumably do the updating. It has been cast as sacrosanct in a gentlemen's agreement between the main powers of government to keep progress from actually happening...partly, this is good, because the result would almost surely be the breakup of our Republic between these forces (and possibly another civil war, as many of those who would revise the Constitution along anti-progressive lines have imperialist, Dominionist, and fascistic ambitions, and would not permit a progressive and secular state on their borders).
Speaking of those forces, the Democrats really should be dancing in celebration at the news of Libby's skirting of justice, and I suspect that they secretly may be. This can do nothing but damage the already flagging candidates that the Republicans are putting forward. And oh, they are a wretched lot. McCain just fired fifty staffers for lack o' cash, and has positively looped himself in with the "nutbar" segment of the Party, with his old, crazy coot rantings about Iran and such earlier in the campaign - definitely not the hip, Daily Show audience that he was aiming for. Brownback - along with Tancredo and Hunter - made himself look silly with his views on evolution and compounded the problem in a newspaper column defending that view. Tommy Thompson recently gaffed his way into a gay-bashing, and all of them supported springing Libby. Romney is the only one that's avoided anything seriously wrong, and he's the Party leadership's punching bag.
More to say, but I'll say it later.
First of all, I'm very chagrined that I am now no longer the only Scooter in politics. Sure, Libby is still criminally guilty, but he'll have a nice cushy office at the Cato or AEI in about...oh, what time is it now? And meanwhile I'll be taking myself out of a job with the Green Party. (Scooters tend to fare badly in news stories. I've never really made any, as five hundred thousand Greens nationwide are easily ignored by the MSM...besides Libby, the only Scooters that have made the news are Scooter Herring, in a 1970s drug bust trial that involved Cher and the Allman Brothers, and Scooter McCray, a short-lived basketball player who didn't quite make the transition from college to the pros.)
Anyway, tacnukesoul quotes George Mason in pointing out the problem with Bush letting Libby off the hook. Along with Patrick Henry, Mason was probably the most ardent anti-Federalist out there - not that he didn't like the idea of Federalism, but he was certainly opposed to the Constitution.
The Constitution has been kept in the form it's in for as long as it has not because it is a great document. It is exceptionally well-crafted, but is in many ways outmoded and ill-fitting a society of the Twenty-First Century. The reason why it is not updated is because of the small minds in power who would presumably do the updating. It has been cast as sacrosanct in a gentlemen's agreement between the main powers of government to keep progress from actually happening...partly, this is good, because the result would almost surely be the breakup of our Republic between these forces (and possibly another civil war, as many of those who would revise the Constitution along anti-progressive lines have imperialist, Dominionist, and fascistic ambitions, and would not permit a progressive and secular state on their borders).
Speaking of those forces, the Democrats really should be dancing in celebration at the news of Libby's skirting of justice, and I suspect that they secretly may be. This can do nothing but damage the already flagging candidates that the Republicans are putting forward. And oh, they are a wretched lot. McCain just fired fifty staffers for lack o' cash, and has positively looped himself in with the "nutbar" segment of the Party, with his old, crazy coot rantings about Iran and such earlier in the campaign - definitely not the hip, Daily Show audience that he was aiming for. Brownback - along with Tancredo and Hunter - made himself look silly with his views on evolution and compounded the problem in a newspaper column defending that view. Tommy Thompson recently gaffed his way into a gay-bashing, and all of them supported springing Libby. Romney is the only one that's avoided anything seriously wrong, and he's the Party leadership's punching bag.
More to say, but I'll say it later.