Founding Fathers - Brilliance or Luck?

This segment examines the motivation of the Founding Fathers. Currently, many political groups are using the writers of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution as symbols of what we want to strive for, but do we really understand their motivations. Was the success of these documents brilliance or luck? This is part of the Political Common Sense for America series.

Overturning Gay Marriage Ban

There is a lot of press right now on the overturning of the gay marriage ban in California, but I think the bigger issue is that the government shouldn't have anything to do with it in the first place. Marriage is a religious ceremony that has been hijacked by the government to enforce a legal contract on people. This is a contradiction to the 1st Amendment. Find out how this can be fixed.

9/11 Terrorist Trial - Attacking the Constitution

Our current administration has found it fit to bring the 9/11 terrorists to NYC. They will sit in a civilian criminal court. They will be given the rights of an American citizen and have the U.S. Constitution in their corner. Besides the concern of further Muslim extremist attacks during the trial, there is a greater fear – the evisceration of our Constitution.

Let me explain, there are four Constitutional issues that will be put into question: Miranda, chain of evidence, illegal search and seizure, and coercion/torture. It is almost certain that the detainees weren’t Mirandized prior to questioning. The chain of evidence was more than likely not followed in the villages and mountain of Afghanistan and Pakistan where these individuals were captured. I highly doubt there was a search warrant issued for the military team that captured them. Finally, any amount of information gathered without the presence of an attorney could be suggested to be coerced.

What does this mean? Every stitch of evidence against these terrorists could be thrown out. Within a civil criminal court it will be hard to convict these individuals, but that won’t happen. The citizens of this country won’t allow it. We are being put into a Catch-22. We are being given a choice between justice for those who died in 9/11 or our civil liberties. That is the trade off. The reality is that they will be convicted, and in doing so we will gut our own Constitution. This trial will create legal arguments for the government to walk all over our civil rights. If evidence is allowed with disregard to the Constitution we will have set a precedent that there is no turning back from.

The fact that we are allowing foreign war criminals the use of our constitution is ludicrous. I have fought the urge to question the motivation of this administration, but this act makes me doubt their motives and intent.

Perspective is Missing

I had some business up on Capital Hill this past week and decided to add a few days on to the trip to do some tourist stuff. The Smithsonian museums are always fun. I also like to visit Arlington National Cemetery and the Vietnam Veterans Memorial every few years because it keeps things in perspective for me. While listening to partisan banter and watching politicians attempting to change our way of life, it strikes me that we should enact a rule that once a year everyone in Congress should have to read the U.S. Constitution, out loud, in Arlington Cemetery. Maybe, just maybe, with all of the tombstones staring back at them they might just grasp how important our rights are and gain perspective before changing something so many people sacrificed so much for.