In the interest of discussing the issues more (which is, all too often, done very little in the political sphere), I have the following to post. This is the last section of my platform. Actually, it is the only part of my personal issue platform that doesn't contain actual planks, just statements of principles. Think of them as the foundation upon which the rest of the platform is built. Basically, this section embodies three principles: the rule of law, freedom, and the golden rule.
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1
- Legislate less; let people live more. Live and let live. The
individual’s freedom is the foundation of America’s greatness past and
its strength to come.
2
- Preserve life to the utmost. This does not exclude the use of the
death penalty, as its execution properly recognizes the sacred
importance of life. Capital punishment should be sparingly used, though.
Only three types of crimes really deserve it: rape, murder, and
treason. Prosecuting abortion isn’t about violating a woman’s body or
right to choose; it is about not punishing the innocent in the name of
serving another’s wishes OR assuaging her undeserved suffering.
3 - You can’t legislate morality. You create an environment in which morality can thrive. That environment is freedom.
4
- The best person to be in charge of a parent’s child is the parent.
Not the federal government, an international body, a public school or
daycare, or anyone else.
5
- Rights are negatively secured, not positively mandated. Thus, the
right to freedom, life, the holding of one’s property--these are about
something of yours not being taken from you. These are rights. The right
to an education, a good job, a nice home, healthcare--these are not
rights--they are positively enforced. They are about giving you
something you don’t already have, not about securing what you have
already earned.
6 - Legislation guided by special interests is especially wrong.
7
- Equality is about not placing one race, gender, people group above
another, not about making up for past wrongs, or overcompensating to tip
the balance of “advantage.” Equality is about treating with an even
hand, almost as if the race, gender, ethnicity is not seen.
8 - The greatest robber, and the one which usually gets away with it, is the government.
9 - Keep it simple; keep it fair, keep it unforced, if possible.
10
- When there is a question about federal law, consult the Constitution.
Before a federal law is made, consult the Constitution. Before anything
is done by the federal government, consult the Constitution. It’s the
rulebook.
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The entire platform can be found here.
This is cool. I should do something like this someday. A few pointed questions:
ReplyDelete"Preserve life to the utmost. This does not exclude the use of the death penalty, as its execution properly recognizes the sacred importance of life."
This sounds like an extremely fluid definition of "preserve" and "utmost." I obviously disagree with your position, but I don't have a problem with it so much as with the way you've phrased your justification of it . . . In what way does killing a human being, any human being, represent the obviously PROPER way to recognize the SACRED IMPORTANCE of human life?
"Prosecuting abortion [...] is about not punishing the innocent in the name of serving another’s wishes OR assuaging her undeserved suffering."
"You can’t legislate morality. You create an environment in which morality can thrive. That environment is freedom."
I agree completely with the latter, more-or-less up to the last sentence. But I sense a possible contradiction with the former, no? Also, does morality really thrive in response to greater freedoms? I'm all for promoting a moral culture AND a culture of freedom, but the two are frequently at odds.
"The best person to be in charge of a parent’s child is the parent. Not the federal government, an international body, a public school or daycare, or anyone else."
Does anyone, anywhere disagree with this as an ideal? But it's so vastly removed from the reality of abusive parents, absent parents, and broken families, how can it be a reasonable basis for making policy?
"Rights are negatively secured, not positively mandated. Thus, the right to freedom, life, the holding of one’s property--these are about something of yours not being taken from you. These are rights. The right to an education, a good job, a nice home, healthcare--these are not rights--they are positively enforced. They are about giving you something you don’t already have, not about securing what you have already earned."
Two questions, then: First, what place, if any, do you see for government provisions regarding any of those non-rights? Second, to what extent does it matter that the majority of Americans would have a hard time pursuing what you characterize as rights without access to the things you've decided aren't rights?
I agree, in some cases enthusiastically, with pretty much everything else.
"This sounds like an extremely fluid definition of "preserve" and "utmost." I obviously disagree with your position, but I don't have a problem with it so much as with the way you've phrased your justification of it . . . In what way does killing a human being, any human being, represent the obviously PROPER way to recognize the SACRED IMPORTANCE of human life?"
ReplyDeleteI would say you're probably right about my use of the language, in that I could have used different language to get across my idea.
To answer the question about capital punishment, let me back up a few paces and start with this. The reason we have government, we need government, is to protect the rights of the people. Protect them from each other and from foreign forces. Executing justice is just one branch of government. The justice system plays its own part in protecting the rights of the people, mainly by dealing out reparation on the behalf of the wronged and producing prevention of future injustice. Since it is the rights of a person that are taken from them in a crime, it is the rights of the criminal that should be taken away both to enact vengeance on behalf of the victim and to put fear in the heart of the one contemplating crime. Thus, the criminal has forfeited some right or rights of his by committing the crime because he desecrated the rights of another.
Now, when I think of how a criminal who takes away someone's right to live should be punished, how their rights should be waived, it makes the most sense that they have lost their right to live themselves. This is also biblical; just consult Genesis 9. It shouldn't be an eye for eye type of deal necessarily. If a criminal tortured his victim to death, it would be inhumane to do the same to the criminal because ultimately, it is not about exacting the same thing that the criminal did to another. The purpose of the justice system is to preserve the rights of the people. It does this by showing that those who take away other people's rights will not go unscathed without losing some of theirs.
That's a rather wordy way to back up my point. I'll get to your other questions later.