The way the other half thinks

I heard this discussion replayed on Rush Limbaugh.  The oringinal airing was on CBS Sunday Morning with Charles Osgood.  The speaker is Georgetwn U. Prof Louis Michael Seidman.  The topic- should we hold the constitution in such reverence?  I'll give you a link to the whole thing here,  but I want to pull out some of the "highlights":

To be clear, I don’t think we should give up on everything in the Constitution. The Constitution has many important and inspiring provisions, but we should obey these because they are important and inspiring, not because a bunch of people who are now long-dead favored them two centuries ago.

Suppose that Barack Obama really wasn’t a natural-born citizen. So what?

This is our country. We live in it, and we have a right to the kind of country we want. We would not allow the French or the United Nations to rule us, and neither should we allow people who died over two centuries ago and knew nothing of our country as it exists today.
If we are to take back our own country, we have to start making decisions for ourselves, and stop deferring to an ancient and outdated document.

Now, I can see that some people believe this is a legitimate point, and so it is.  But let's take a look at this, shall we?

The Constitution of the United States is one of the most emulated documents of all time.  Not one country that has cast out despots has not had as their first goal a constitution, ansd many of them want one based on ours.  People die to make it to this country and live under this constitution.  Does that really sound like an ancient and out-of-touch document to you?

The speaker says we shouldn't have to live under laws that no longer apply to "our country as it exists today."  But apparently he'd be more than happy if a foreigner, who is not germaine to this same country, was president.  Why stop at Barack Obama?  Why not Schwartzenegger?  Or Sarkozy? Or Hugo Chavez or Imanutjob in Iran?  Remember the last German not born in Germany to rule that country?  You know, little guy, mousy little mustache, yelled a lot?  He was born in the Austrian Empire, dontcha know.  I can't believe that this professor wants to get rid of the Constitution because it's like being ruled by a foreign power but thinks that foreigners who don't meet citizenship requirements are okay for president.  (Note that I am NOT, and will NOT, get into the birther thing.  I'm just pointing out that his "so what?" is hypocritical.)

Bu the key to the whole thing is the "take back our own country" line.  Take it back from who/what?  The Constitution?  It is obvious that what he is saying is that he approves of Obama's "executive decree" style of rule.  Just get rid of the Constitution, and apply whatever seat-of-the-pants solution to the problem de jure appeals at the time.  I think I can give you a very good example of the fruits of such a style will bring us, from a children's song:

There was an old lady who swallowed a fly
I don't know why she swallowed a fly - perhaps she'll die!
There was an old lady who swallowed a spider,
That wriggled and wiggled and tiggled inside her;
She swallowed the spider to catch the fly;
I don't know why she swallowed a fly - Perhaps she'll die!
There was an old lady who swallowed a bird;
How absurd to swallow a bird.
She swallowed the bird to catch the spider,
She swallowed the spider to catch the fly;
I don't know why she swallowed a fly - Perhaps she'll die!
There was an old lady who swallowed a cat;
Fancy that to swallow a cat!
She swallowed the cat to catch the bird,
She swallowed the bird to catch the spider,
She swallowed the spider to catch the fly;
I don't know why she swallowed a fly - Perhaps she'll die!
There was an old lady that swallowed a dog;
What a hog, to swallow a dog;
She swallowed the dog to catch the cat,
She swallowed the cat to catch the bird,
She swallowed the bird to catch the spider,
She swallowed the spider to catch the fly;
I don't know why she swallowed a fly - Perhaps she'll die!
There was an old lady who swallowed a cow,
I don't know how she swallowed a cow;
She swallowed the cow to catch the dog,
She swallowed the dog to catch the cat,
She swallowed the cat to catch the bird,
She swallowed the bird to catch the spider,
She swallowed the spider to catch the fly;
I don't know why she swallowed a fly - Perhaps she'll die!
There was an old lady who swallowed a horse...
She's dead, of course!

 

 

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In other news, while I didn't destroy the machine I'm using on my new job on day one, I certainly brought it to a standstill with a half-hour to go in the day.  Well, not only me- the problem was apparently fabric having built up around the axle that moves the belt.  After two people looked at it to find out what was making it jam for twenty minutes, I discovered the problem with 5 minutes left in the day, and it took me, the boss, and (mainly) the maintenance dude another 20 minutes to fix it.

 

I can't wait to see what I do Wednesday, when they have a bunch of big shots in for the building's ribbon cutting ceremony!