Socialism, Not Republicanism, is the Real Extremism

[AnotherRican]

Socialism, Not Republicanism, is the Real Extremism

By Colin McNickle
TRIBUNE-REVIEW
Sunday, June 12, 2005

To get a starkly disturbing idea of how deeply American liberals have failed in understanding, honoring and executing the Founders' republican mission, all one has to do is, amazingly, look at the front page of last Thursday's New York Times.
David D. Kirkpatrick offers a stellar profile of Janice Rogers Brown, a black "daughter of Alabama sharecroppers" finally confirmed the day before by the Senate to sit on the D.C. federal appeals bench.

Given the liberal bent of The Times, it would be easy to read the headline -- "Seeing slavery in liberalism" -- in the mocking tone that one normally associates with a leftist broadsheet's profile of a prominent conservative.

But a funny thing happened on the way to what normally would have been a hatchet job: The Times' showed Judge Rogers Brown's sight to be 20/20 while showing liberals to be suffering from macular degeneration.

Mr. Kirkpatrick quotes selectively, but quite nicely, from some of Rogers Brown's public comments. Among the best:

"In the heyday of liberal democracy, all roads lead to slavery."

"We no longer find slavery abhorrent. We embrace it."

"If we can invoke no ultimate limits on the power of government, a democracy is inevitably transformed into a kleptocracy -- a license to steal, a warrant for oppression."
In the first two quotes, Rogers Brown obviously is talking about how liberal social policies foster not independence but dependence and how they usually have the exact opposite effect of their promoter's "beneficent" purposes.

In the third quote, she's obviously talking about government as a maniacal Leviathan, and a leviathan with no constitutional warrant for most of what it does.

Yet, Kirkpatrick quickly notes, these are precepts that liberals cited as examples of Rogers Brown's "extremism."

How instructive. How sad. How frightening. Some of the fundamental building blocks of our constitutional republic are considered "extreme" by Democrats and their liberal moneybags.

Blogging on LewRockwell.com last month, poster William Anderson offered some other Rogers Brown quotes that had turned apoplectic the "progressives" (i.e., socialists) at People for the American Way. Please indulge me as I share some more of her "extremism":

"I have argued that collectivism was (and is) fundamentally incompatible with the vision that undergirded this country's founding. The New Deal, however, inoculated the federal Constitution with a kind of underground collectivist mentality. The Constitution itself was transmuted into a significantly different document."

"Some things are apparent. Where government moves in, community retreats, civil society disintegrates and our ability to control our own destiny atrophies. The result is: families under siege; war in the streets; unapologetic expropriation of property; the precipitous decline of the rule of law; the rapid rise of corruption; the loss of civility and the triumph of deceit."

"Where government advances -- and it advances relentlessly -- freedom is imperiled; community impoverished; religion marginalized and civilization itself jeopardized. ... When did government cease to be a necessary evil and become a goody bag to solve our private problems?"

"Government acts as a giant siphon, extracting wealth, creating privilege and power, and redistributing it."
And, finally, the complete second slavery quote that was truncated by The Times:

"(W)e no longer find slavery abhorrent. We embrace it. We demand more. Big government is not just the opiate of the masses. It is the opiate. The drug of choice for multinational corporations and single moms; for regulated industries and rugged Midwestern farmers and militant senior citizens."

These truths are self-evident. And it's pretty rough stuff -- for socialists, that is. The good judge's critics find such prose to be "extreme" because it is anathema to the collectivist mind-set of which Judge Rogers Brown warns.

A threatened socialist, of course, is a vindictive socialist. He rails and flails about "the system," its "failures" and its "lack of social justice." But the very "solutions" proposed by the socialist involve a wholesale dismantling of the best system ever devised to promote justice -- giving equal opportunity (not equal results, mind you) to those willing to work (versus those all too willing to work the system).

The socialists' solution is, in a word, a lie. And it's a prevarication with a long rap sheet -- history.

Janice Rogers Brown will spend the next several years cutting her federal teeth on one of the most important appellate courts in the land. And don't be at all surprised if she's someday nominated to the U.S. Supreme Court. She'd be a great addition to the high court. But attempts again will be made to cast her as an "extremist."

Perhaps by then good republicans will have reclaimed the word and expose the real extremists. Perhaps.

Colin McNickle is the Trib's editorial page editor. Ring him at (412) 320-7836. E-mail him at: cmcnickle@tribweb.com.

You can't still believe that after the charade last week.

If you do, you have chili for brains.

[JaneMas]

LMAOL! Lolllllllllllll

But seriously we turned a new leaf because of this event. We have taken back our country from the rich.

[AnotherRican]

Originally Posted by Delgado22

You can't still believe that after the charade last week.

If you do, you have chili for brains.

Delgado, you act just like a very confused liberal. I still believe that Socialism is Evil at the core. The difference between you and me is that you believe in the government being your mother. I don't. I believe the government should protect your God-given rights for freedom (not slavery to government) and to protect your life (terrorism, crime, not killing babies, etc.). Believing that the government failed in protecting the citizens of Miss. and LA. does not mean I endorse Socialism. If you read the passage of Romans 13 you will see the purpose that God instituted government for.

No I don't have chili for brains. You must have jumbalaya for brains.

[AnotherRican]

Originally Posted by JaneMas

LMAOL! Lolllllllllllll

But seriously we turned a new leaf because of this event. We have taken back our country from the rich.

What on earth are you talking about? You are sounding like the Free Market hating Suki!

[JaneMas]

I'm sorry....I meant WEALTHY.

[AnotherRican]

Originally Posted by JaneMas

I'm sorry....I meant WEALTHY.

Jane, you are saying the same thing. Apparently you are against anyone who has prospered in life. By that definition you would qualify, so it would be a put down on yourself.

Trashing folks who have prospered is trashing those who typically provide most jobs and pay peoples' checks. I know that the Brat wants the government to eventually take over this part of life in a totalitarian fashion. YOu are sounding like her more and more. If true, that is extremely sad and shortsighted. Please tell us this is not what you mean.