I am trying to be as neutral as possible in saying that: constitutionality is just not something they care about. What they care about are (what they think or at least pretend to think will be) cost savings, getting a ‘comprehensive system’ in place, and that sort of thing. They DO NOT CARE whether what they seek and hope for and argue for is constitutional.I completely agree. 100%. And neither does anyone else. The constitution is being used as a weapon by conservatives against liberals because they can on the Obamacare issue. And on the gun issue. On the other hand, it was used the other direction on prayer in schools. And on flag burning. And more or less by the libertarians on almost all topics....bceause we don't (any of us) care about what the constitution says. We care about getting things to work our way. The constitution is sometimes strong support...and sometimes in the way. Usually, the constitution is a bolstering argument for the libertarian vision (It was written by folks whose views count as mostly libertarian today)...and so libertarians usually like it. However, libertarians don't (usually) fall in the reverentialist camp...we fall in the pro-liberty camp...and the constitution is an argument that other people pretend to care about when it suits them...so we call out their hypocricy. If it ever made a strong anti-libertarian argument...we'd drop it like a hot potato.
But I agree that that liberals don't give a **** about the constitution. And neither does anyone else.
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I agree that most moderns -- liberals, libertarians, conservatives -- don't really care about the Constitution. However, this is nowhere near 100% of the people. I don't think you get that many traditionalists do care. They actually revere the thing. It is not just talk. It feels to them like the Bible feels.
This gets back to the accusation I leveled at you last week, of ingratitude. I expect that you feel no moral duty whatsoever to your dead forbears, to do what they would have wanted -- but some people do. Just as they take the Bible as God's Word on the supernatural, luckily come to them via their honored ancestors, they take the Constitution as inspired by God. Their ancestors fought for it, and they believe in it.
Leonard,
It's a good call. I am grateful to those who I think created the modern world: Henry Ford, Nichola Tesla, John Locke, Thomas Jefferson, and such.
I revere the ideas, and the accomplishments...but it's the reverence of the scientist, where I want to improve things...not just to keep what we have.
Overall...good call...to a significant extent, I am entirely unfamiliar with reverence for the past. That is not to miss the gratitude to the past...but it takes a hugely different form than it does for most.
Thanks for the clarity of insight
Yes, this is part of the moral blindness that Haigt talks about: you have to feel the "Communitarian" thing to revere ancestors, I think. And maybe also some of that "Divine". Neither of which I get much -- I am pretty blind too, in the standard libertarian way.
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