The United States is a nation of laws, not men.
The United States of America is a nation of laws, not men. In our Supreme Court’s first and foremost landmark case, Marbury v. Madison, 1 Cranch 137 (19803), Chief Justice John Marshall inveighed those words against Secretary of State James Madison.
“The government of the United States has been emphatically termed a government of laws and not men.”
President Obama affirmed this position in his inaugural address on Tuesday:
America has carried on not simply because of the skill or vision of those in high office, but because we the people have remained faithful to the ideals of our forebears, and true to our founding documents.
I’m not sure that he is purposefully lying so much as that words do not mean what he thinks they do.
Witness Obama’s selection to be Secretary of the Treasury: Timothy “TurboTax” Geithner. Certainly, Geithner is a tax cheat who will run the Internal Revenue Service. He’s the bumbling constructor of TARP. But, you know, Geithner has been described as “possibly the only man for the job of healing the recession.” There will be a great gnashing of teeth, sayeth the prophet, then Geither will lay hands will lay hands and heal the recession. Heck, he might be better than Benny Hinn.
Alas, as the New York Times forecast last week, Geithner’s personal skill has overcome his persona foibles including his non-payment of the federal income tax during his time working for the IMF. The United States is a nation of Men, not Laws. This is the exception that shatters the rule, and it now means absolutely nothing.
The tally was 18-5, and the tax cheat has received the endorsement of the Senate Finance Committee. The full Senate will accept him today, like a line of comatose old men who can manage only a thrill up their legs.
The United States is a nation of Men, not Laws.
Steve Maley
KnightsofMalta
Dan Spencer
Moe Lane
Dan McLaughlin
Disgusting
tsil (Diary) Thursday, January 22nd at 3:36PM EST (link)Senator Jim Burr (R-NC), I’m watching you. If you vote Yea, like you did for Hillary, you’ll hear from me.
Exactly - and James warned against being "respecters of persons"
civil truth (Diary) Thursday, January 22nd at 3:50PM EST (link)The principal wall that has saved our nation from tyrrany has been the conviction that we are a nation of laws, not men – and allegiance to our laws and to the procedures for changing them as necessary, even if we might suffer some personal loss in the short term.
It’s like that dialog in “A Man for All Seasons”, once we tear down the protection of laws in the name of expedience and personal gain and loyalty to a man (in that case Henry VIII) then we have cast aside our protection from tyranny. And history tells us that fellow-travellers are usually the first to perish under the new regime.
This is indeed a dark day for freedom and a giant step towards cult of personality, as it ratifies in the legislative branch what most in the judiciary have already surrendered to – that we abandon principle for calculating what comprises the fleeting partisan advantage of the moment.
Or even worse, the abandonment of objective truth for self-interest.
The end is that our national motto becomes “L’etat c’est moi” – the age-old chant of despots.
We are enmeshed in a land of sunshine patriots and summer warriors of both political parties who have taken over our highest institutions. No good can come of that. Whether enough of our citizenry will rise up in time remains to be seen.
Not a good start – the trajectory is sharply hellward.
The greatest evil…is conceived and ordered (moved, seconded, carried, and minuted) in clean, carpeted, warmed, and well-lighted offices, by quiet men with white collars and cut fingernails and smooth-shaven cheeks who do not need to raise their voice. Hence, naturally enough, my symbol for Hell is something like the bureaucracy of a police state or the offices of a thoroughly nasty business concern. -C.S. Lewis
http://www.gmsplace.com/
Four years from now,
ColoKid Thursday, January 22nd at 9:00PM EST (link)if he pays his taxes in the meantime. or even if he doesn’t, Geithner will likely still be the SecTreas. Most of us will still be alive then, and whether we are richer or poorer or whether the country is better off or worse, the Obama administration will procaim, and the media will confirm, that it and Geithner have saved the country from the ills of another Great Depression, thus justifying his appointment and Obama’s reelection. Even worse than a nation of men, we are becoming a nation without any values, save self-aggrandizement.
It really stretches the old parenting skills
Praying (Diary) Thursday, January 22nd at 9:39PM EST (link)When I can no longer hold up our president and elected officials as examples for my children to aspire to, but rather have to point them out as examples of the evils of selfishness, greed, and corruption to be avoided in their own lives at all costs. Fortunately, somewhere along the line my kids heard about Ronald Reagan – seriously my 16 year old’s hero. “Ronald Reagan wouldn’t do it that way” is his response to about everything these days. Good boy!
No!!!11!1!!1!1! The Bilderbergers are coming