[Home] [Headlines] [Latest Articles] [Latest Comments] [Post] [Mail] [Sign-in] [Setup] [Help] [Register]
|
Status: Not Logged In; Sign In
United States News Title: Why Obama’s lie on marriage matters March 6, 2015 (ThePublicDiscourse.com) -- When running for the presidency in 2008, Barack Obama misled the voters about his true position on the question of same-sex marriage. This is not an accusation made by one of the president’s political enemies, but an admission made by one of his closest political advisors: David Axelrod. According to Time magazine, Axelrod’s new book about his career in politics reveals that candidate Obama really believed in same-sex marriage, but he publicly said that he opposed it because he feared the electoral consequences of his real convictions. In response to the mini-burst of commentary and indignation that this news has provoked, Axelrod has complained—not very convincingly—that his story has been distorted. In an interview on the question, he derides criticism of the president’s dishonesty as “gotcha” politics, emphasizing that he never said that Obama had “lied” about his position on same-sex marriage. While it is true that Axelrod did not use the word “lie,” nothing in the interview modifies his original claim that as a candidate Obama—at Axelrod’s own urging—put before the voters a position on a public question different from the one he actually held, and that he did this because he thought it would increase his chances of winning the presidency. Cynics will dismiss this story as commonplace: politicians mislead voters all the time, they will say. This is a deadly error. In this question, it’s not just the issues in a given election that are at stake. It’s the nation’s commitment to representative self- government—a commitment that is nothing but a sham if candidates for office are not duty-bound to tell the truth when soliciting the public’s votes. Government by Consent One of America’s fundamental political principles is the doctrine of government by consent. The founders intended to establish, and every generation of Americans since has sought to preserve, a form of government in which the people give the basic direction to public policy by electing representatives to make laws and administer the government for them. There can be no genuine consent, however, and hence no meaningful self-government, when politicians mislead the voters. We often think of despotism as operating by force, and so it often does. Force simply overpowers the governed and therefore negates the possibility of consent. Falsehood, however, is another, and often an equally effective, tool of despotism. It, too, negates the possibility of real consent. The problem becomes clear if we put politics aside for a moment and reflect on simple forms of interaction between private individuals. Under the law, force or the threat of force voids a contract. Everybody knows that the famous “offer he couldn’t refuse” made by Don Corleone in The Godfather cannot be the basis of a morally or legally valid agreement. If you put a gun to a man’s head and tell him that “either his brains or his signature are going on that contract,” he will probably choose the latter option. Nevertheless, the law and every decent person will acknowledge that there is no morally or legally binding contract in such a case, because the man’s free consent is utterly lacking. Such a “contract” would be equally worthless if a man were induced to sign it not by the threat of force but instead by misleading him about its contents. If you spend an hour drawing up a contract with a man and then substitute another while he is not looking, you might succeed in getting him to sign something of which he has no knowledge. Yet here as before, there was no free consent and hence no real agreement in this case, because the victim was misled. What is true in private between individuals holds as well in public between candidates for office and the voters. Here, no formal contracts are signed. Still, something morally analogous is going on, and must go on if self-government is to be more than a delusion. Poster Comment: We often think of despotism as operating by force, and so it often does. Force simply overpowers the governed and therefore negates the possibility of consent. Falsehood, however, is another, and often an equally effective, tool of despotism. It, too, negates the possibility of real consent.
Post Comment Private Reply Ignore Thread Top • Page Up • Full Thread • Page Down • Bottom/Latest
#1. To: redleghunter (#0)
All government actually complies with your comment; in fact, your family probably does as well. So what?
Not by force.
"Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever." (1 Peter 1:23)
|
|
[Home] [Headlines] [Latest Articles] [Latest Comments] [Post] [Mail] [Sign-in] [Setup] [Help] [Register]
|