Yesterday, September 17^th, was Constitution Day.  It was celebrated mostly by ignoring it.  As evidence, did you notice the surprise when a federal judge in Pennsylvania based a ruling on it?  The ruling called to mind such things as the right to associate together (peaceably), no arbitrary taking of livelihood and property, or the freedom to practice one’s religion.  Or even that unknown clause demanding the federal government guarantee a republican form of government to the states.  Even a judge found it hard to reconcile that with a governor being able to declare an emergency, granting himself dictatorial powers and then extending it as long as he likes, with no accountability. 

Many were appalled at the judge’s audacity to involve the constitution.  The vociferous opinions were almost unanimous – scientists are to rule!  Politicians should do as scientists say!  The overthrow of the centuries of understanding that the truths enshrined in the constitution were more valuable than life itself was drowned in the consensus that they weren’t worth risking getting sick.

I was taught at Penn that politics was the “master science.”  I also studied the beginning and advancement of the “Progressive” attempt to develop a scientifically-based “organizational society” – one variation called it the “therapeutic state.”  Well, the nanny state has arrived in all its squalor.

R. I. P. Constitution

The last several months have given the residents of America an opportunity to see what life under socialism would be like.  I urge people to think about what they’ve experienced.

•  War on the Poor – [with Middle class now being included with the poor] The poor became the pawns in the game of life.  They were stripped of their livelihood without compunction, then pacified with a few ‘borrowed’ dollars that will be repaid with money taken from them at a future date.
•  Subsidies to the rich – Billions of tax dollars were transferred from the poor/middle class and given to the rich in subsidies and bail-outs of big businesses, with airlines being a prime example.
•  Class warfare – Few were stigmatized as heartily as those who wanted to work in a closed-down business.  “Black markets” were forming over even insignificant business transactions.  Those politically favored were permitted to harass and destroy the lives of those out of favor with the political elite.
•  Centralized dictatorial powers – Petty tyranny, often in a velvet glove at this point, was the name of the game.  Executive orders dictated where a resident could go, with how many, and what could be done.  Businesses that were in favor reaped a bonanza, while those out of favor were shuttered, sometime destroyed.  Retribution by the powerful against those in disagreement was common and blatant.  Courts were shown to be another arm of the elite.  Any semblance of the “republic” guaranteed by the Constitution was flouted.
•  Churches persecuted – In some cases, churches were shut down, in others the church-goers were harassed.  The government dictated what religious practices were allowed, denying, in some places, a practice as basic to religion as singing.  The number of people who could attend services was prescribed.
•  Life was drab – Period.  Sports, concerts, and parties were all taboo.

Fortunately, few governors felt comfortable fully enforcing all the rules.  Perhaps it was the fact the President didn’t support a total fascist takeover by the left-leaning governors.  Or perhaps it was the rising tide of opposition by the oppressed.  Whatever, if America continues its downward spiral, fueled by the unthinking masses blindly following the trends of the day, one shudders to think what will happen at the next major exercise of statist power.

Modern man laughs at the sheep-like, order-following Medieval man.  He ridicules that man and his superstitious life.  But we ought to look around.  Other than the fact the State has overtaken the Church as the wielder of “Truth,” little has changed.

Actually, it’s worse.  When the church issued the edicts, there was always an outside source of truth that could be appealed to – the Bible – that the church acknowledged as authoritative.  Today, all truth is considered subsumed by the State.  Even though it is seated on a pedestal by modern man, science’s authoritative voice is the practitioner with the highest standing in the State’s bureaucracy.  Justice, too, no longer has a meaning beyond what the State says.  Reality, and therefore truth, is simply the narrative the State weaves.

For the person who sees the nakedness of the Emperor, there is no anchorage remaining for dissent.  Pity modern man!

What do you call a political system in which one person can 1) declare an emergency, 2) take exclusive control of any and all actions and activities that may conceivably affect or be affected by said emergency, 3) suspend all laws otherwise in place that touch on said emergency, 4) control the lives, movement, livelihood, and association of everyone under his jurisdiction, 5) ignore and threaten to punish any citizen, other duly elected official or political jurisdiction that deviates from his edicts, and 6) renew his self-ordained authority at his will?

In high school civics, I learned to call such a political system a dictatorship.  In college, teachers got fancy and called it the “Führer principle,” in honor of its most despised practitioner.  It was, supposedly, so despicable a political system that we were justified in sacrificing thousands of lives to stop it in the 1940’s.

But it’s back.  And we’ve adopted it as our own modus operandi.  The Washington Post claims President Trump follows this principle.  But he was obviously a weak proponent – he allowed, at least somewhat, for the principle of federalism (to Dr. Fauci”s consternation.)  So, Governors to the rescue!  Several governors made a name for themselves showing how such constraints are only words on paper.

I was also taught that, as an American, I live under law, not whim.  First, under the law given by God – the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.  These rights were further enumerated by a Bill of Rights, and a constitution that guaranteed political and legal procedures would sustain them.  These rights would be safeguarded by a legal system comprised of two different levels of courts, so if the state level wouldn’t support those rights, the federal would.

Obviously, someplace between 1776 and 2020, those rights were lost.  Oh, the form is still there, but the content has evaporated into the rarefied air of Marxist political theory.  The form of the court system is now used to rubber-stamp [explain and justify] the actions of the Fuhrer.

I do not deny the Fuhrer principle operates under more constraint here than many other places.  But it was also evident that the only real restraint on the governor’s actions was what little sense of decency he had left.  But a soft-spoken, compassionate-sounding tyrant is still a ruler that should not be.