"FOX News and the Tea Party" by Geo. Washington

[James H. Bushart]

From September 17, 1787 through January 12, 1788 there was much debate in the American newspapers concerning the idea of a stronger federal government that the new constitution would provide for over the existing, and financially bankrupt, Confederation of States.

There were the conservatives with their roots buried deep within the traditions of their European ancestors...and the liberals, led by a radical group of young men named Jefferson, Adams, and others who had a new and untested idea.

These articles, along with many letters that were also published in these papers, were compiled into a two volume set of books that I like to spend winter afternoons reading. Been doing it for years.

Today, I was astounded to read from a letter that George Washington wrote to his nephew, Bushrod Washington, who would someday become a U.S. Supreme Court justice. In this letter, he described what we know today as the FOX News channel.

I don't expect those who value this station as their news source to agree with me, but I am sure that others who obtain their news and world views from more than one source will immediately recognize the similarities.

Washington, of course, was in favor of the new constitution that was supported by his liberal friends.

Read his letter....and think about recent subjects like ...oh....health care reform, for instance.

"The oppponents I expected, (for it ever has been that the adversaries to a measure are more active than its Friends) would endeavor to stamp it with unfavorable impressions, in order to bias the Judgment that is ultimately to decide on it, this is evidently the case with the writers in opposition, whose objections are better calculated to alarm the fears, than to convince the Judgment, of their readers. They build their objections upon principles that do not exist, which the Constitution does not support them in, and the existence of which has been, by appeal to the Constitution itself flatly denied; and then, as if they were unanswerable, draw all the dreadful consequences that are necessary to alarm the apprehensions of the ignorant or unthinking."

The writing style is colonial and outdated....but the message is as clear and as relevant as anything being presented today.

[Michael Larson]

Washington, of course, was in favor of the new constitution...

As are those in the tea party.

They do however object to the leftists/liberal view of using the courts to legislate rather than interpret the text and intent of its writers and instead of making changes agreeable to them through the legitimate amendment process pack the courts with those who feel the have the right to produce law and not just interpret it.

Jim should pay a bit more attention to this part of Washington's letter

The warmest friends to and the best supporters of the Constitution, do not contend that it is free from imperfections; but these were not to be avoided, and they are convinced if evils are likely to flow from them, that the remedy must come thereafter; because, in the present moment it is not to be obtained. And as there is a Constitutional door open for it, I think the people (for it is with them to judge) can, as they will have the aid of experience on their side, decide with as much propriety on the alterations and amendments which shall be found necessary, as ourselves; for I do not conceive that we are more inspired—have more wisdem—or possess more virtue than those who will come after us. The power under the Constitution will always be with the people.

[Russell J. Hensel]

Originally Posted by mlarson

As are those in the tea party.

They do however object to the leftists/liberal view of using the courts to legislate rather than interpret the text and intent of its writers and instead of making changes agreeable to them through the legitimate amendment process pack the courts with those who feel the have the right to produce law and not just interpret it.

Jim should pay a bit more attention to this part of Washington's letter

Interpret the text of its writers......so now people are to assume what they meant for it to morph into 225 years later. They were leaders not fortune tellers!

[Michael Larson]

Originally Posted by rhensel

Interpret the text of its writers......so now people are to assume what they meant for it to morph into 225 years later. They were leaders not fortune tellers!

And that is why they allowed for change via the amendment process.

Why is that so hard for some to see?

[John McKenna]

The letter sounds like it is warning us of liberals, not Fox News.

[Nick Gromicko]

If anyone thinks the federal government should do the central planning for everyone... move to N. Korea. The U.S. employs over 4 million federal employees who's job it is to take money from some and give it to others. If a hedge fund wasted this much on asset allocation, the head of the fund would be cell mates with Madoff.

[James H. Bushart]

Originally Posted by gromicko

If anyone thinks the federal government should do the central planning for everyone... move to N. Korea.

This was a common argument among those in the 1787 news media who opposed the adoption of the constitution. Think of how different the world would be, today, if they were successful in preventing ratification.

A reply written in a Philadelphia newspaper on 10/24/1787 actually accused the framers of the constitution as being spies for the "Aristocracy" in their "secret deliberations" to force this terrible constitution on the American public.

Far from being supportive of the founders, today's Tea Party members are repeating the same rhetoric of those who opposed the work of the founding fathers. I find that very interesting, indeed.

[Nick Gromicko]

I don't see the Tea Party movement complaining about the Constitution in general.

[John McKenna]

Originally Posted by jbushart

This was a common argument among those in the 1787 news media who opposed the adoption of the constitution. Think of how different the world would be, today, if they were successful in preventing ratification.

The fear of gov't power was why our entire form of checks and balances was put in place, the bill of rights were added, and so much debate was done before the constitution was approved. Those who want to expand gov't are not on the side of the constitution.

Washington's Farewell Address

In it, Washington warned us of the dangers of Big Government. He told us to watch out for the tendency of government to encroach on individual freedoms and consolidate its power. What American can say this warning has not been justified by subsequent events? "A just estimate of that love of power, and proneness to abuse it, which predominates in the human heart is sufficient to satisfy us of the truth of this position," Washington said.

Our only defense against an over-reaching, tyrannical government, Washington insisted, is the Constitution's strict limits on government power. Washington said that unless these limits were carefully adhered to -- that is, unless the federal government exercised only those functions specifically delegated to it by the Constitution and by the authority of the people, and no more -- the nation would become vulnerable to "cunning, ambitious and unprincipled men."


Washington was warning us against the corrupt nature of men who lust for power, in both parties, and the masses who will give it to them for a piece of bread and the promise of security.

Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety (cradle to the grave rights to health care, welfare, handouts), deserve neither Liberty nor Safety. - Benjamin Franklin

Once you give power to the gov't, they are not going to give it back. The tea party is anti-big gov't, and pro constitution.

[James H. Bushart]

Originally Posted by gromicko

I don't see the Tea Party movement complaining about the Constitution in general.

No...probably because many of them (or, at least, the most vocal of them) have never actually read it, or anything else connected with it, other than what their "keywords" help them to Google to support their spins.

What they object to...as did those who objected to its formation in 1787...was a powerful federal government that would have direct authority over the individual states.

As one man published in the New York Journal on 11/29/1787..."...that by ratifying the constitution, as the convention proposed it, the people will leave the liberty of the press, and the trial by jury, in civil cases, to the mercy of their rulers - that the project is to burden them with enormous taxes, in order to raise and maintain armies, for the purposes of ambition and arbitrary power - that this power is to be vested in an aristrocratic senate who will be either themselves the tyrants or support of tyranny, in a president, who will know how to manage them so as to make that body at once the instrument and shield of his absolute authority."

[Nick Gromicko]

What they object to...as did those who objected to its formation in 1787...was a powerful federal government that would have direct authority over the individual states.

Someone should tell our federal government... they have no direct authority over individual states even though they won the War of Northern Aggression under the leadership of that war criminal, racist, Abraham Lincoln.

[James H. Bushart]

Originally Posted by gromicko

Someone should tell our federal government... they have no direct authority over individual states even though they won the War of Northern Aggression under the leadership of that war criminal, racist, Abraham Lincoln.

LOL. You are about 220 years too late with that argument. It's already been made...and lost.

The war you mentioned was fought, primarily, because the authors of the constitution left it to the next generation to resolve the issue of slavery in a nation founded upon the principles of freedom and human dignity. Agreements could not be reached a their convention, so the topic was tabled.

When the liberals (of their day) changed the colonial confederation into a collection of individual states under one federal government, they did it over the objections of the conservatives (of their day) who objected and sided with England during the war. Many conservatives who supported the war of independence came to regret it when their businesses and enterprises collapsed under the loosely formed confederation and they opposed any new constitution...favoring a return to trade that was based on more stable English currency. Then, when it came time to formulate a set of rules to govern by...the liberals split into a variety of factions that had quite a bit of difficulty coming to agreement which resulted in a constitution that .... either by design or through its intended vagueness .... became a living document that allowed the following generations to amend and interpret as the country developed from a small agriculturally based society to a world super power.

[John McKenna]

The Tenth Amendment explicitly states the Constitution's principle of federalism by providing that powers not granted to the federal government nor prohibited to the states by the Constitution of the United States are reserved to the states or the people.

I guess some do not read the constitution.

[Brian K. Smith]

I guess some do not read the constitution.[/quote]

It sure seems like it...

[Brian K. Smith]

Originally Posted by gromicko

If anyone thinks the federal government should do the central planning for everyone... move to N. Korea. The U.S. employs over 4 million federal employees who's job it is to take money from some and give it to others. If a hedge fund wasted this much on asset allocation, the head of the fund would be cell mates with Madoff.

agree....overpaid, cant get fired...ect ect....this list goes on and on....