Travis Rowley: Rand’s First Stand

Saturday, March 09, 2013

Travis Rowley, GoLocalProv MINDSETTER™

 

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Travis Rowley analyzes the political impact/significance of Rand Paul's filibuster

“If we lose freedom here, there is no place to escape to. This is the last stand on earth.” – Ronald Reagan

Could there have been a less opportune time for the Left to mount an assault on 2nd Amendment rights than during the Obama era of unprecedented federal bravado?

During a time in which those who store “more than seven days of food,” or are “reverent of individual liberty,” or are “suspicious of centralized federal authority” have been placed under suspicion of being potential domestic terrorists, we now witness the “leaking of official whitepapers alleged to justify the use of drones to execute American citizens abroad.” And, most recently, we’ve seen the Obama administration vacillate when asked point-blank whether or not the President of the United States has the Constitutional authority to drone-strike an American citizen – while on American soil.

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Good luck, leftists, as you plead with the American people to trim their right to bear arms.

Some Have Lost Touch

This week millions of liberty-minded Americans were well represented by Senator Rand Paul’s 13-hour filibuster of John Brennan’s nomination to lead the CIA – a protest that Paul said would last “as long as it takes, until the alarm is sounded from coast to coast that our Constitution is important, that your rights to trial-by-jury are precious.”

Senator Paul was accompanied by a slew of Republican lawmakers (and one Democrat), including Senator Ted Cruz (R – Texas), who briefly took over for Paul by reading the infamous letter written by Lt. Col. William Barret Travis just days before the deadly siege of the Alamo, a letter that ends with the cry “Liberty or Death.”

Not everyone applauded Senator Paul and his colleagues. Establishment Republican Senator Lindsay Graham ridiculed his efforts, saying, “This idea that we’re going to use a drone to attack an American citizen in a café in America is ridiculous.” Graham was backed by John McCain, who called Paul and his allies “wacko birds,” claimed that Paul’s caution over mainland drone attacks was “totally unfounded,” and claimed that the filibuster was not “helpful to the American people.”

While Paul was whipping up enthusiasm all across the blogosphere, McCain and Graham dined with one of the most deceitful and radical individuals to ever occupy the Oval Office – further illustrating just how much they’ve lost the spirit and purpose of the American vision; that is, to secure a land of liberty for posterity.

As Senator Paul made clear, he does not believe that President Obama has any intention of ordering drone strikes on American citizens, but that it is his responsibility to imagine a day when the nation elects someone who would; and then imagine if the US Senate, in the years prior, had allowed the legal justification for such an action to stand. According to Paul, this was the aim of the Constitution – to abandon faith in men, and to establish liberty by law.

"A government of laws and not of men,” as John Adams enshrined into the Massachusetts Constitution.

A Moment of Change?

Unfortunately, most modern politicians have discarded this governmental discipline, and are hung up on just how much they trust themselves. Drunk on freedom, they are forgetful of the dark history of the world. Incapable of perceiving themselves as the problem, they can’t imagine a day of tyranny – always neglecting Reagan’s warning: “Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn't pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children's children what it was once like in the United States where men were free.”

“Yes I would have,” answered Mitt Romney during a presidential primary debate. “And I do believe that it’s appropriate to have in our nation the capacity to detain people who are threats to this country…I don’t think [President Obama] is going to abuse this power, and I know that if I were President I would not abuse this power.”

That was Romney’s response after a debate moderator asked if he – like President Obama – would have signed the National Defense Authorization Act, a law that enables the President to “indefinitely detain American citizens in US Military custody.”

Romney trusts himself? Romney trusts Obama? Here we have a Republican, expressing the imprudence that has become the hallmark of big-government liberals, people who openly express contempt for the Constitution.
Perhaps it’s little wonder that Romney failed to secure as many votes as John McCain.

Rand Paul’s filibuster was nothing short of inspirational, a brash act of defiance against an unforgiving and self-interested political establishment; a brilliant speech aimed at the political Left, an entity whose express purpose is to subdue and circumvent the Constitution – to forever expand the size of government and concentrate its power.

Paul’s filibuster was the Tea Party personified. And, God willing, will become the new face of the GOP.

Travis Rowley (TravisRowley.com) is the author of The RI Republican: An Indictment of the Rhode Island Left.

 

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