Catholic and Enjoying It!
To be uber-clear, here’s what I’m *not* saying. I’m not saying Paul or his followers are terrorists. Of course not. He’s one of the few pols who I think can be trusted actually (though I also think he is a quintessentially doomed quixotic candidate for Prez and therefore somebody I might well vote for if he ever makes a run). Morever, Paul is one of the few people who made it clear on the national stage that not only is abortion evil but all the Cheneyite BS about “enhanced interrogation” was filthy Orwellian craptalk for “torture”. He is one of the few people on the national stage to make clear that our both the Left and the Right are selling their souls to consequentialism and lying about grave and intrinsic evil in the service of their respective agendas.
No, my concern is different. Both Left and Right have been, in the own way, engaged in the project of identifying zealous faith in the state with “love of country” and, increasingly, skepticism about the state with “treason”. The Left does it when it tells us that we have to enthusiastically support the abortion and tax regime or be identified as “haters”. So the Tea Partiers, for instance, get accused by the Lefties as an Enemy Within, teeming with “domestic terrorist” wannabes. Meanwhile, the Right does it when it impugns the patriotism of those who question the entire insane project of transforming our valiant opium-selling and child sodomizing Afghani allies into suburban America. Recall David Frum’s “Unpatriotic Conservatives” bull of excommunication and, of course, the habitual recourse the Right makes to swastikas and hammers and sickles when attacking the Left. Also, the whole “Let’s bring assault rifles to Presidential appearances to prove our patriotic devotion to the second amendment” thing looks nutty. And there are the maniacs who fly their planes into IRS offices to prove their point as true American patriots.
Now the dolts on both Left and Right who have been making excuses for Salvation Through Leviathan by Any Means Necessary have this in common: they believe in salvation through Leviathan when it comes to their own utopian schemes. The only real difference is that Lefties believe the American state can redeem and heal the human race within our borders, while Righties believe it can do it via Grand End to Evil projects abroad. Each looks at the other with contempt and a growing sense that the faith the other has in the American state poses a danger. Yet each is stone blind to the danger their own faith in the government represents. The Lefty adoration of Obama was utterly blindsided when Obama voted himself the power to declare any American citizen he pleases an enemy of the State and order his murder without arrest, trial, or evidence beyond the despotic will of Barack Almighty, Lord of Heaven and Earth.
Meanwhile, the Right, having defended King George the 43rd’s trampling of the Constitution and enactment of the Torture Regime that was to keep chickenhawks safe, is likewise at sixes and sevens trying to figure out how to deal with the consequences of its blind and stupid support of the Monarchical Presidency. Incredibly, some of the police state enthusiasts from the Thing That Used to Be Conservatism over at NRO are *still* cheering for the expansion of despotic presidental power to kill any citizen at will without trial or evidence. Cuz that keeps us all safe, doncha know.
Sooner or later though, even somebody as foolish and blind as an End to Evil torture enthusiast should wake up and realize that there is no particular reason our American Caesar should forever confine his definition of “terrorist” or “enemy” to foreigners who look different, speak a strange language, or wear funny clothes. The dolts who are currently cheering for the President’s self-granted 007 against every American citizen should really start to think about the day when our State turns from threats abroad, starts looking closer to home at perceived enemies and begins to deal with all those Good White Christian folk who “hate the government” or are regarded as, in some way, a “domestic terror threat”. All it will take will be a press release to the NY Times explaining that some anonymous “official” “believes” that some guy with mutton chops and a John Deere hat with an “Obama=Hitler” sign on his pickup is a “potential terrorist” and that poor sap will be a legit target for CIA murder, using *exactly* the same standards that fools like Andy McCarthy eagerly embrace when cheering for Obama’s assassination program abroad.
Consequentialism is a sin. And boy oh boy does this sin make make its practitioners stupid.
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