As the march toward November 2nd, 2010 continues, it really turns my stomach to see more and more political rhetoric where candidates are now claiming to be MORE "constitutional" than their opponent. For example, during the primaries in Utah's U.S. Senate race, both candidates Mike Lee and Tim Bridgewater laid claim to the Constitution as their guide. Please explain how EITHER of these guys call themselves fans of the Constitution yet oppose birthright citizenship?
And where in the Constitution does it talk about Social Security? But constitutional "expert" Mike Lee offers the unconstitutional solution of simply raising the retirement age but isn't that a bit like re-arranging the deck chairs on the Titanic? You don't have to tweak already doomed institutions. For example, as an entrepreneur, I helped to found the leading consulting firm in the Reverse Mortgage space to help create market-based solutions to the problem of senior funding.
How can these Constitutional Experts support the unconstitutional War on Drugs (remember, Prohibition? You need a Constitutional Amendment to make prohibition the law of the land and last I checked, we never ratified an Amendment to prohibit drugs).
And interesting Constitutional aside for Utahns, the Twenty-first Amendment, which ended prohibition, was ratified when Utah became the state to cast the deciding 36th vote to ratify the Twenty-first Amendment on December 5, 1933. Utah's subsequent infamous and unusual liquor laws were a direct result of its decisive vote to end the government enforced prohibition of alcohol.
Recently, a headline at the satirical Onion website read: Area Man Passionate Defender Of What He Imagines Constitution To Be. I call these types "A La Carte Constitutionalists". You know the type, they pick and choose the parts of the Constitution they like and disregard the rest. Their piecemeal approach may be truly deceitful or merely done for expediency's sake (e.g., being a "constitutionalist" makes a great sound-byte) but either way it is wrong.
"[i]t is true that, in the United States, at least, we have a constitution that imposes strict limits on some powers of government. But, as we have discovered in the past century, no constitution can interpret or enforce itself; it must be interpreted by men. And if the ultimate power to interpret a constitution is given to the government