Do the Safety Dance!

I’ll bet that, regardless of whether or not you agree with me politically, I can make a political statement that we will both agree with.  Ready?  Here you go:  I am sick and tired of politicians who either don’t know or don’t care what their jobs are.  So what do you think?  Pretty good, eh?  And I’ll go one step further:  I think they actually DO know what their jobs are, and further that they know WE know they know what their jobs are, and I believe they just don’t really care one itty-bitty bit.

Case in point:  Recently, in an interview on CNN with Jessica Yellin, President Obama said the following:  “What is absolutely true is that my first job, my most sacred duty as President and Commander-in Chief, is to keep the American people safe…”.  Now I am going to make another bet.  I bet most of you reading this think that he’s right, right?  I mean, he is in charge of the military, and their mission is to keep us safe, right?

Let me give you a partial quote.  See if you know where this line comes from:

“I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend …”

I know, I know – I left off the last few words.  We’ll get to those in a few minutes.  Do you know where these words come from?  These words are specified in article two, section one, clause eight of the United States Constitution.  Article two specifically defines the office of the Presidency, including what the term should be, how the President is elected, how the electors are chosen, when the election is to be held, who can be president, how they can be removed from office, the salary to be paid, the oath of office, and what powers the president has in the office.

So, based on the comment of the President of the United States, the end of that quote must be something like, “…the people of the United States.”  That would make a lot of sense, right?  Especially since 9-11, we have all been inundated with our federal, state and local governments ‘protecting’ us.  I was just listening to Bill O’Reilly on Fox News tonight and in his segment with Alan Colmes and Monica Crowley they all agreed that being safer is the thing that makes all of the cost worthwhile and that at least two of them don’t believe that they have lost any liberty since 9-11.  As an aside, I found it interesting that Alan Colmes, the most liberal one of that bunch, is the one that paraphrased Benjamin Franklin when he said, “Those who sacrifice liberty for security deserve neither”.  Bill O’Reilly should know better and should know that just because he has only lost liberties that he doesn’t really use, doesn’t mean he hasn’t lost any liberty.

Back to where I was heading: To my way of thinking, the real question is, “Exactly how much protecting do we really need?”  When did we decide that a bunch of lawyers and accountants that we elected to write laws and deal with international issues could protect us?  As I mentioned in an earlier blog, one of my favorite quotes is, “when seconds count, the police are just minutes away.”  If the police are minutes away, how far off are the nitwits that populate our elected offices?  Ever sent a letter to a politician???

Sad to say, I may have to admit that we may have grown into a country where the Presidential oath will likely in effect, if not in fact, say, “… support and defend the people of the United States.”  But really, what’s wrong with that, I hear some of you asking.  Well, first, let’s see what the President actually swears to do.  Here’s the entire oath:

“I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.”

Well, the military MUST be there to protect us.  I bet their oath says something like that, right?  Here’s the oath of enlistment into all of our armed forces except the National Guard (the National Guard oath is very similar, but includes wording about the orders of the Governor of the state):

“I, (NAME), do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice. So help me God.”

Hmmm – still nothing about protecting the people.  Maybe Congress is supposed to protect us:

“I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter: So help me God.”

All right then.  It MUST be the Supreme Court, then:

"I, _________, do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter. So help me God."

One note here:  All federal employees are required by 5 U.S.C. 3331 to take this oath.

I can hear you asking, “Ok, so if the President, the Congress, the Supreme Court, the Military and all federal employees aren’t supposed to protect us, who, exactly IS supposed to protect us????”

The truth is that the job of the President (and Congress and the military), according to their oaths, is NOT to protect and defend the people.  The oath is very specific.  The primary function of the President – the ONLY function codified in an oath is the preservation, protection and defense of the Constitution of the United States.  But guess what?  This is even BETTER than an oath to protect us!  It’s nutshell time: 

The most important thing that our Federal Government can do is to adhere, rigidly, to their mandate in the Constitution!  If they will do that one, single, simple little thing, we will absolutely, unequivocally, be safe.  If the Federal Government preserves, protects and defends the Constitution, this obligates them to provide those things that protect the people, not only from those outside the country who would do us harm, but also from threats inside the country and from themselves.  The founding fathers were certainly concerned about enemies who would attack us.  However, it is also very clear when you read the Constitution and other writings at the time, that there was a tremendous amount of fear of the government and its ability to harm the people.

If you think this is an overstatement, remember that back in 2009 the Department of Homeland Security released a threat assessment called, “Rightwing Extremism:  Current Economic and Political Climate Fueling Resurgence in Radicalization and Recruitment” (I bet somebody got paid by the word for that title!).  I don’t want to get too far off the topic, but here’s a quote from this idiotic document:

“Rightwing extremism in the United States can be broadly divided into those groups, movements, and adherents that are primarily hate-oriented (based on hatred of particular religious, racial or ethnic groups), and those that are mainly antigovernment, rejecting federal authority in favor of state or local authority, or rejecting government authority entirely. It may include groups and individuals that are dedicated to a single issue, such as opposition to abortion or immigration.”

Wow – so if you are opposed to abortion (or any single issue, apparently), you are a right-wing extremist.  Since 50% or more of the population of the United States believes abortion to be wrong, that makes half of the country right-wing extremists.  I guess I wonder why you wouldn't be an extremist if you support abortion.  Aren’t both equally valid points of view?  This report goes on to label returning military veterans as potential “…violent neo-Nazis, skinheads and other white supremacists”.  It says that if you are opposed to illegal immigration, that you are an extremist.  It implies that if you and your friends all agree on one of these issues, that you may be a ‘small terrorist cell’. 

I don’t want to over-dramatize this or beat this horse too hard.  To be fair, when this report ‘accidentally’ become public, there was a huge out-cry and ultimately, the official pronouncement was that this document wasn’t official policy.  The problem is that there is a lot of official policy that does violate the oaths of office for our elected officials.  Searches and seizures without a warrant are forbidden by the 4^th Amendment to the Constitution. However, if you’ve flown a commercial airline since the TSA came into being, your rights have been violated.  The Joe Biden written and George Bush/Barak Obama signed ‘Patriot Act’ (yes, it is ‘renewed’ every so many years, and President Obama approved it’s renewal) along with the National Defense Authorization Act of 2012 provide for warrantless wiretaps, TSA VIPR teams doing stop and search in major cities and on highways, drones over U.S. cities, cop-a-feel searches at airports and now in subways, train and bus stations, the militarization of local police forces and many, many more direct violations of our liberties as defined in the Constitution.

If our Federal elected officials and the unelected beaurocrats that they put into power simply follow the Constitution, then our liberties are protected, our national security is assured and our ability to thrive and grow as a society and nation are secured.  Our military will always be used to further the goal of protecting the Constitution from those who would harm it – whether they are Islamic extremists or another country threatening our sovereignty.  The Congress will always be watching that the laws they pass fall within their powers, and the President will act as a backstop against laws that aren’t Constitutional, and Congress will act as a backstop against a President trying to grab too much power.  The Supreme Court will ultimately act as the final arbiter of conflict between the laws and Constitution.  At least, that’s how it’s supposed to work.

To my way of thinking, the real problem is that instead of providing ‘safety’ to the American People, by ignoring their oaths, the Federal Government is making us all less safe.  The people are very capable of taking care of themselves if they are just left alone.  Want proof?  How many terrorist threats have been ‘handled’ by the people instead of by the government?  The shoe bomber and the underwear bomber come to mind right out of the box.  What about the Time Square bomber?  On 9-11, which we are commemorating today, did the government save even one life?  Of course not.  The closest thing to a ‘save’ on that day was by the PEOPLE on flight 93 fighting back.  Nobody else had a chance.  The government is very good at Policing – but remember, that Policing is almost always something that happens AFTER something else happens.

The people will ALWAYS be the first line of defense when there is an attack within our nation.  That is our part of the pact with our nation.  We pledge allegiance to the flag, and to the United States of America, and to the Republic for which that Flag and the United States stand.  That’s your part of the pact.  It’s my part of the pact.  We have a duty and an obligation as citizens.  And trust me: it isn’t to watch the Kardashians or Survivor.  We get to do those things because we maintain a free society with government that is “… of the people, by the people and for the people…”.  Trust me when I say we do NOT want that to perish from the earth.  We must remind our elected representatives that they work for us - not the other way around.