Friday, September 12, 2008

Morons, all of them


In this clip, John McCain talks about how he would appoint judges who would be faithful to the Constitution. Whoopi Goldberg asks him if that would mean black people would be slaves, apparently because she thinks slavery was mandated in the Constitution. John McCain thanked Whoopi for bringing up "an excellent point", and said that he understood.

This is not an excellent point. The Constitution never mandated slavery. In fact, it has explicitly banned slavery since 1865.

I hate how McCain couldn't explain this. Based on the video, I don't even think he understands the distinction. Even the most strict constructionist judge would not allow slavery to return. The Thirteenth Amendment is one of very few limitations on individual actions in the Constitution.

The Constitution was not designed to prohibit people from doing things. It wasn't even designed to give people individual rights. It was designed to limit the powers of government. McCain does a poor job playing the role of someone concerned about the Constitution. Check out his quote from 2006 on the Don Imus show:

"I work in Washington and I know that money corrupts. And I and a lot of other people were trying to stop that corruption. Obviously, from what we've been seeing lately, we didn't complete the job. But I would rather have a clean government than one where quote First Amendment rights are being respected that has become corrupt. If I had my choice, I'd rather have the clean government.''

How is a government that ignores its Constitution "clean"?

I'm not buying it.

No comments: