Resurrect The Republic

[Aloysius]

The only candidate who has a chance of saving our great republic is Ron Paul.

[url="http://www.ronpaul2008.com"]http://www.ronpaul2008.com[/url]

[url="http://www.ronpaul2008.com/issues/"]http://www.ronpaul2008.com/issues/[/url]

He's anti-war, but like a republican, not like a hippy. And that's what gets to me: I detest the hippy anti-war people, but Ron Paul's anti-war stance makes sense. Why? Because it's based upon the Constitution. Pure and simple. And then on top of it being sound according to the highest law of the land, he considers just war doctrine.

Can we get a revolution started? Come on people, this is where the future is. Ron Paul has the guts to put everything on the line. I think it's about time I step up and throw down. I am throwing 100% of my support into Ron Paul. If he doesn't win the nomination, I'm not sure I'll even vote for anyone else other than him anyway. I'm certainly not voting Guiliani or someone ridiculous like that.

[url="http://youtube.com/watch?v=SwRXp8ZMdNQ"]http://youtube.com/watch?v=SwRXp8ZMdNQ[/url]

Yeah, you might call me inconsistent, for in the past I've defended Bush a lot. But you know what, it was a negotiation with evil based on the idea that there was no better option available to the United States; in the framework of government and worldwide policy that existed with seemingly no other options at the time, to me, Bush's positions made sense. But Ron Paul offers hope for the Republic to be what it was meant to be. Ron Paul offers hope for the Constitutional Republic. And in that context, it's time to throw out the garbage of the Republicans who have lost their way and get back to

RON PAUL 2008
The only hope for America.

I am convinced. I am formally disavowing my previous support for war-hawk style republicanism, for bush-style republicanism, and re-asserting a beleif in the Constitution of the United States of America.

Godspeed, Ron Paul. Godspeed.

oh, and I know most people have abortion at the forefront of their political minds (as well it should be, it is the greatest evil of our time). I have seen no statement as strong and poignent as Ron Paul's, and what's more, I actually beleive him. He'll do something about it. He won't increase the federal government's power to illegalize it, but nor would any other candidate, but he will do his best to undo Roe v. Wade (he has attempted to undermine it in the congress before)

[url="http://www.ronpaul2008.com/issues/life-and-liberty/"]http://www.ronpaul2008.com/issues/life-and-liberty/[/url]

[SarahB]

The Constitution Party has been meeting with Rep. Paul and talking with him about possibly running on our ticket should he not win the Republican nomination. But regardless of who our canidate ends up being, you should look into them.

I can't vote for Rep. Paul because I'm registered Constitution, but I fully support him, pass out literatrue, etc. And I'm telling all my friends why they should vote for him. I wish him the best, but I doubt he'll even get close. Most voters just go with who the media puts forward, and don't bother looking at the "lower tier" people.

[Aloysius]

if he were to win the Republican nomination, would you vote for him in the general election? I should think the Constitution Party should endorse him if he wins the republican nomination and not even offer their own candidate, as it would be counter-productive.

I know that probably wouldn't happen (him getting the nomination), but I'm just sayin.

[SarahB]

I met with our National Chairman last weekend at our state committe meeting and we wer talking about that. He has said that should Ron Paul win, we'll support him, even as a Republican. What's important is his strong stance on the Constittuion, not what ticket he ends up running under.

But yes, it's unlikely that he'll get the nomination.

And yes, I would absolutely vote for him should he get the Republican nomination.

[catholicinsd]

Also he's the only true pro-lifer running.

[N/A Gone]

[quote name='catholicinsd' post='1396365' date='Oct 1 2007, 11:55 PM']Also he's the only true pro-lifer running.[/quote]

can you prove that?

[catholicinsd]

[quote name='Revprodeji' post='1396378' date='Oct 2 2007, 12:04 AM']can you prove that?[/quote]

As I've often said here, in order to be "Pro-Life" you must be againist not only Abortion and Euthanasia, but also againist most all Capital Punishment and offensive War. I don't wanna start another War/CP debate but suffice it to say that Dr. Ron Paul is the only one with these values.

[ardillacid]

It's 'resurrect.'

[traichuoi]

[quote name='notardillacid' post='1396402' date='Oct 1 2007, 08:32 PM']It's 'resurrect.'[/quote]

Thank you! My pet peeve as well.

[ardillacid]

[quote name='traichuoi' post='1396407' date='Oct 2 2007, 12:35 AM']Thank you! My pet peeve as well.[/quote]
Oh, will you look at that. It magically changed!

[son_of_angels]

O good grief!

If I had a nickel for everytime a reportedly Catholic politician called for a return to the Constitution, I would be a rich man. Yet Constitutionalism isn't what this country needs at the moment, nor a wrong-headed drive to lessen the federal government. Either of these views is both counter-productive and irresponsible. They are counter-productive, because it is through the strength of the Presidency, not the impotency of Congress that this nation has advanced further than ever towards Catholic social ideals, and it is, in fact, the President alone who possesses the strength of office to be a real model of social behaviour for the country. A lessening in his power would only result in power be distributed to the Washington bureaucrats who really do not need any encouragement from us to continue coddling their constituents. It is irresponsible because the United States, contrary to popular belief, is an empire. We behave like an empire, we impose like an empire, we are economically united like an empire, and we are advancing like an empire. We have no choice in the matter except to dissolve the "Republic" (which itself is an imperial term, as originally we were not one republic but 13 republics in one federation), or to accept the mantle of empire which we chose for ourselves beginning with Thomas Jefferson and culminating in the Empire's inauguration in Abraham Lincoln.
One lesson that all Empires must learn is that there is no choice but to advance. Should the nation ever stop growing in power and influence, it becomes weak at the foundations and collapses. Even so, the Constitution, and a kind of reductionist strategy towards its "restoration" is not what is needed. Instead we need real constitutional reform, the kind of reform that can encourage and mandate new situations in our present crisis. For example, there is currently no judicial oversight of the President, which would be solved if the Senate were made the Supreme Court. The Congress does not even really operate as a deliberative body when in plenary session, which would be solved by an appointed Senate taking the lead on the legislative process. Moreover, the popularity of the President is affecting elections in the legislative branch, which in turn makes it impossible to tell who actually is qualified for the job and who just seems better than the current president. This would of course be solved if the President were appointed by a deliberative process by the few, therefore having less public mandate, rather than our current deluded system of popular election.

The Constitution, moreover, is gravely flawed by its reliance on out-moded and unfounded Enlightenment philosophy, which could not effectively imagine government and the Church having a substantial relationship. This was commented on by Popes beginning with Leo XIII.

[Aloysius]

Leo XIII critiqued the way Church and State are conceptualized in our country, but he did not critique (to my knowledge) the concept of federalism. In fact, it is in keeping with the Catholic Social Justice principal of subsidarity which states that what can be accomplished at the lowest level should be accomplished at the lowest level. That's why Pius IX sent a letter of support to Jefferson Davis; Catholic Social Justice demands that local governments have power over their own affairs.

Catholic social justice demands that larger governments only deal with things that larger governments are necessary for; ergo, the only purpose of the Federal Government should be for things that states cannot accomplish on their own; such as inter-state issues, international issues, et cetera.

I'm afraid you have gravely mischarecterized the views of Leo XIII regarding the American Republic. He praised a good lot of it; merely saying the the concept of Church/State was not ideal, but that it at least allowed the Church freedom to operate and thus could be praised for that.

The Constitution does not directly contradict any principals of Catholic Teaching regarding government, except for semi-problematic views on Church and State. I would defy you to show me where it did.

[Farsight one]

While I agree that his chances of winning the Republican ticket are slim, if he does, I see him as a shoe-in for president.

Ron Paul is the kind of candidate that gets me off my butt to go and actually register to vote.

[Mateo el Feo]

[quote name='catholicinsd' post='1396385' date='Oct 2 2007, 01:09 AM']As I've often said here, in order to be "Pro-Life" you must be againist not only Abortion and Euthanasia, but also againist most all Capital Punishment and offensive War. I don't wanna start another War/CP debate but suffice it to say that Dr. Ron Paul is the only one with these values.[/quote]This may be the criteria that you use for determining a "true" pro-lifer, but you can't impose this definition on others.

[son_of_angels]

The problem is, that the principle of subsidiarity really should only be applied that already assumes that the highest level of government has the potential to exercise full authority when needed. For example, subsidiarity would become unjust if, instead of the federal government outlawing abortion, it used subsidiarity to blame the states who lack the political wherewithal to do so. Necessity makes the higher powers act.
Likewise, when the Holy Roman Empire was forming to unite Europe and defeat Islam, plenary power was always given to the Emperor, because no one else could accomplish nor hold together what he was trying to accomplish. As for the Civil War, as a Southerner I certainly have sympathies for the Southern cause, but our (Southern) grievance in that case could be justified not because we had the intrinsic right to act on our own authority, but because the Constitution and state governments seemed to grant that right. It was a matter of law not of natural rights.

I will go more into Leo XIII's position later, if time allows.

[dairygirl4u2c]

in addition, in order to make ron paul not ineffective, democrats should not be voted for, often. each congressman should be looked at in general, but they are not cooperating with things like privatizing SS and reforming welfare medicad medicare and they are pushing for even more spending and waste through natinoalized insurance. at the very time they should not they are pushing for insurance nationally...

i'm a populist for the most part, but i htink most republicans are not hardlineers and would allow some support for the down trodden, without casting all aid as only to be taken care of by charity.

[Aloysius]

I'm not sure how effective Ron Paul could be with either side at the helm of the Congress. The Powers that Be would not like him one bit. He could reshape the executive branch, and veto budgets that spent too much, even maybe sign some executive orders abolishing some branches of the federal government

Like I said, you have to be worthy of being an Empire to deserve to be one. Why are we an empire? An immoral economic system has created that situation. Do we deserve to be an empire? No. Therefore, follow the Constitutional prohibition against us having centralized power or an empire and return to the state-based-model, leaving the federal government's task only that which is proper to the federal government: unity between the states and foreign policy.

Leo XIII did not believe in centralized power. Following in the footsteps of Pius IX, Catholic Social Justice has always fought against the centralization of power in nation states beyond the legitimate bounds of what is necessary to be done by central powers.

The Holy Roman Empire deserved to be an empire, for one part. The reason for the Holy Roman Empire to be an empire, though? Not so that some guy in Austria could decide what the dress code was in some far corner of the empire (random extreme example, but apply that to any law that could effectively be accomplished at the local level); but to have a united Europe in the face of foreign powers, to keep peace amongs all the members of that united empire.

Micro-managing empires are always and everywhere to be considered immoral and contrary to the dignity of man; for it makes a man subject to powers too far beyond his reach for him to have any fair treatment. Centralized power is only permissable to accomplish things which cannot be done effectively at local levels, and sometimes to bring local levels into line with moral order (such as making certain all forms of murder are illegal if and when some local government decides that murder should not be illegal)

if local governments are illegalizing murder in a perfectly competant way, however, there is no need for any larger centralized authority to illegalize murder. it is only if some locality decides to make murder legal that a centralized authority has to intervene.

this is considered the justification of the Civil War. Okay, I could buy that, if all we had done was free the slaves and then gave all states back their competant authority. But we didn't do that, we strengthened the Federal Government not only to end a moral problem, but then also over things which were not in the Federal Government's proper competancy.

(and I assume we all know I was talking about abortion up there, as there are not many places left in the world which would actually permit murder at any level of power)

Anyway, I'm a big fan of Leo XIII, I know all about his condemnation of the "heresy of Americanism", and that does not condemn America nor federalism in the slightest. You're going to need some quotes to back up your outlandish claim that Leo XIII would support America having a powerful centralized federal government.

What subsidarity is all about is proper competancy. If an issue is the proper competancy of a local authority, then no centralized power has competant authority to overrule that local authority.

and to Dairy, this goes much deeper than "government or charity" as regards theoretical models of government. it's really "federal government or state government".. and then "state government or local government"... the idea would be to de-construct all the federal aid programs and divide them up to be managed by the state governments. then it's a matter of the state government's deciding how much the more local governments can competantly deal with their own issues. It would only be at the level of local government that the question would arise on whether to leave this or that type of aid up to a charity or deal with it through the government.

[son_of_angels]

I do not intend to support my claim that Leo XIII would support centralized federal power. On the contrary, I would argue that the problem is that we have a federal system, and that a Constitutionalist federal system no more preserves subsidiarity than elections preserve virtue.

Subsidiarity can be applied by a government which has greater power, and seeks to overturn in-between governments, like the hopelessly populist state governments in this country (training grounds for the pork-driven US Senate) who coddle the American people, because subsidiarity is a virtue, not an institution. It means that someone who does have the power to act DOES NOT act when someone with better knowledge and judgment can make the decision instead. However, subsidiarity becomes a democratic appeal to bureaucracy and corruption when, instead of ensuring that the lesser powers are in fact just and knowledgeable you instead appeal to these homespun governments in order to make one's own play for power: by pretending to be in favor of the people's own creation. Someone who appeals to federalism is not appealing so much to the Constitution as to the ignorance of the American people.
Again, federalism is NOT equivalent to subsidiarity it is a mockery of it.

As for "deserving to be an Empire," this is ridiculous. Charlemagne did not deserve to have an empire, he deserved to protect Rome and Europe. This does not necessarily grant him license to create his own regime over other national entities. He was PRIVILEGED to gain an Empire, as has been this United States, who has no more deserved to govern the Western Hemisphere than any other nation, nay, even less than other nations, but has instead been privileged to do so, as in the matter of the Middle East. Indeed, I can think of no person who has, by nature, the right to rule over such a large expanse as the President of this nation already does, but, because we have endured and avoided what has ensnared most nations, the privilege belongs to us.

What needs to happen first, of course, is the advancement of this nation in virtue and morality. This can and must be the goal of the federal government. It begins with right-headed foreign policy, and ends with Constitutional revision.

[dairygirl4u2c]

granted it's not federal government the issue, at least the only issue.
it's charity v. the principle of subsidiarity. some issues demand charity, other issues demand government intervention. some issues demand local government control, others demand federal control.
issues that cause states to compete at the expense of the downtrodden are prone to requiring federal intervention. there's many issues one could cite. i'm big on the minimum wage, and i guess i'd point to environmental regs too. companies are known for switching when things get hard, switching states. uniformity of laws prevent that.
but it does go beyond competion. such as states that do not want to punish rapists. (this is mroe historical than anything) and the feds need involved.

generally though, subsidiary is the best. that's why ron paul is good. as long as he's not taken to the extreme. he'd have to learn to compromise, at least a little if he's going to be president. that's always the question, how and when to compromise. comprise is the moral solution, after all, at least sometimes, if not many or most times.

[Aloysius]

This is where you and I diverge: I say that subsidarity ought to be institutional. That when larger centralized governments are formed, they should not hold power over things which belong to the lower authorities. That a Federal Government should not have authority over the basic laws of a locality. That any extended centralized power, be it a Federal Government, an Empire, a European Union, or a United Nations, ought not to have any more power than the power to do that which cannot competantly be done by smaller local governments. If a smaller/local government illustrates its incompetance at doing something, then the larger government may step in and interfere, not as one who normally holds authority over that thing, but as one who is the only competant authority which can restore moral order.

Since when is subsidarity a virtue? It's a principal of good governance, a principal of social justice. Principals ought to be applied, not just by the individual decisions of rulers, but by the framework of states.

"deserve to be an empire" was simply my poetic way of combining "acheived empire status through noble means" and "had a model of empire which was acceptable from a Catholic point of view" ie, the purpose of their empire was merely to accomplish things which needed to be accomplished but could not be accomplished by individual state governments.

dairy, Ron Paul will certainly compromise on various issues where he sees fit I'm sure; however, he will not compromise in ways people will like. He'll follow the axiom "if I'm not authorized by the constitution to do it, I will not do it" and "if the congress is not authorized by the constitution to do it, I'll veto it" and "if this federal program is not authorized by the constitution, I'll abolish it". It's one thing to ask for various policy compromises, it's quite another thing simply thinking about the model of government and the role of the presidency. He will carry out the role of the presidency that he sees the constitution as defining. How can a president compromise the role of the presidency in any way? Could he really say "okay, I'll do this one unconstitutional thing to make you happy"? no, he really couldn't, because as far as he's concerned, that'd be breaking the highest law of the land.