Alan Keyes
Is Romney Obama's socialist role model?
By Alan Keyes
Reportedly, Obama's supposed switch to support for gay marriage drove many evangelical Christian voters into the Romney fold. The story moved me to share this comment with my friends on Twitter: "I guess some evangelicals fled to Romney because he's already done what Obama only wants to do — impose gay marriage by Executive Order."
I know, Romney's apologists claim that he had to obey the opinion of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court. However, in its opinion, that court made clear that the laws enacted by the Legislature in Massachusetts did not permit same-sex marriage. The court's opinion also made it clear that the Constitution of the State of Massachusetts forbids the Judiciary from changing the law. Thus when he ordered justices of the peace to perform gay marriages, then-Gov. Romney violated the laws of his state and ignored the court opinion he claimed to be following. In thus usurping legislative power, he did what the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court refused to do.
So Romney's abuse of executive power to impose gay marriage in Massachusetts isn't just about promoting gay marriage. It's about acting on an understanding of government that erases the separation of powers, a constitutional feature America's founders rightly declared essential for preventing dictatorial government. Many so-called Republicans pretend to decry what they see as Obama's desire to erase this feature. Yet they now want voters to believe that it will be preferable to put the executive power of the U.S. government in the hands of a man who has already done what they say Obama is trying to do. What sense does this make?
Ironically, Obama's supposed change of position on gay marriage helps the so-called Republicans get away with this nonsense. Given Obama's actions with respect to gay marriage, what intelligent conservatives in their right mind were actually taken in by his anemic professions of respect for the God-endowed natural family? Obama forced acceptance of open homosexuality in the military on equal-rights grounds (A position Romney says he will continue). He refused to be the legal advocate for the Defense of Marriage Act, on equal-rights grounds. The logic of Obama's actions thus contradicted and undermined his proclaimed respect for the natural family. Judged in light of his actions, it was clear that he was lying about that.
People who treat Obama's verbal profession of a switch on gay marriage as significant are tacitly promoting the irrational notion that we can judge a politician by his words, without taking his actions into account. Of course, that's exactly the notion conservatives have to buy into in order to pretend that Mitt Romney offers any alternative to Obama's drive toward totalitarian socialism. We've just seen that on the issue of gay marriage Romney has already done what Obama just said he would like to do. Similarly, as governor (and thereafter as a candidate for president in 2008) Romney proudly pointed to the move toward socialist health care in Massachusetts (Romneycare) as a model for the nation. That model included the mandated insurance features and the government funding for abortions Obama is still struggling to impose on the nation. Here again, Romney has already done what Obama is only trying to do.
From abortion to tax cuts there's almost no issue on which Romney's campaign rhetoric today matches up with his actions (or words) from yesterday or the day before (as it were). Given their respective records, the main difference between Obama and Romney is that, thanks to the false Republican label, Romney is more likely to slip the socialist poison past the otherwise rejecting taste buds of people who think of themselves as conservatives. In this respect Romney undoubtedly wins the support of the God-rejecting elitist powers that are using the sham two-party system to manipulate Americans toward a similarly God-rejecting socialist future. As I said in the latest article posted on my blog, "His record suggests that, though he moves toward the objective with a more deceptively alluring style than Obama, Romney will herd Americans more surely and quietly into the stock pens of totalitarian socialism."
From a strictly academic viewpoint, I feel a profound sense of tragic irony as I watch Americans wrestling with the unyielding truth that their character and liberty are being done to death by elite elements that have abandoned the moral and constitutional vision of America's founders. Every day I hear from or meet people grieving for their nation, like members of a close-knit family keeping vigil in their hearts in the last weeks of a beloved parent's life. Others, of course, care about nothing except to divide up the legacy.
In this respect the Democratic Party represents the ones who wouldn't mind at all if someone plunged a knife into the parent's heart. Romney Republicans are those who abhor that messy alternative, preferring instead a gentle poison. But the ones I'm talking about pray to God, as I do, for a miraculous healing; they say to God that they would gladly give of heart and life themselves to be a part of it. The series of articles posted in the last week or so at my blog come from a place of prayer like that. Is that where you are? If so, the series I have written may be good fodder for thought and, God knows, even for action.
May 21, 2012
Reportedly, Obama's supposed switch to support for gay marriage drove many evangelical Christian voters into the Romney fold. The story moved me to share this comment with my friends on Twitter: "I guess some evangelicals fled to Romney because he's already done what Obama only wants to do — impose gay marriage by Executive Order."
I know, Romney's apologists claim that he had to obey the opinion of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court. However, in its opinion, that court made clear that the laws enacted by the Legislature in Massachusetts did not permit same-sex marriage. The court's opinion also made it clear that the Constitution of the State of Massachusetts forbids the Judiciary from changing the law. Thus when he ordered justices of the peace to perform gay marriages, then-Gov. Romney violated the laws of his state and ignored the court opinion he claimed to be following. In thus usurping legislative power, he did what the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court refused to do.
So Romney's abuse of executive power to impose gay marriage in Massachusetts isn't just about promoting gay marriage. It's about acting on an understanding of government that erases the separation of powers, a constitutional feature America's founders rightly declared essential for preventing dictatorial government. Many so-called Republicans pretend to decry what they see as Obama's desire to erase this feature. Yet they now want voters to believe that it will be preferable to put the executive power of the U.S. government in the hands of a man who has already done what they say Obama is trying to do. What sense does this make?
Ironically, Obama's supposed change of position on gay marriage helps the so-called Republicans get away with this nonsense. Given Obama's actions with respect to gay marriage, what intelligent conservatives in their right mind were actually taken in by his anemic professions of respect for the God-endowed natural family? Obama forced acceptance of open homosexuality in the military on equal-rights grounds (A position Romney says he will continue). He refused to be the legal advocate for the Defense of Marriage Act, on equal-rights grounds. The logic of Obama's actions thus contradicted and undermined his proclaimed respect for the natural family. Judged in light of his actions, it was clear that he was lying about that.
People who treat Obama's verbal profession of a switch on gay marriage as significant are tacitly promoting the irrational notion that we can judge a politician by his words, without taking his actions into account. Of course, that's exactly the notion conservatives have to buy into in order to pretend that Mitt Romney offers any alternative to Obama's drive toward totalitarian socialism. We've just seen that on the issue of gay marriage Romney has already done what Obama just said he would like to do. Similarly, as governor (and thereafter as a candidate for president in 2008) Romney proudly pointed to the move toward socialist health care in Massachusetts (Romneycare) as a model for the nation. That model included the mandated insurance features and the government funding for abortions Obama is still struggling to impose on the nation. Here again, Romney has already done what Obama is only trying to do.
From abortion to tax cuts there's almost no issue on which Romney's campaign rhetoric today matches up with his actions (or words) from yesterday or the day before (as it were). Given their respective records, the main difference between Obama and Romney is that, thanks to the false Republican label, Romney is more likely to slip the socialist poison past the otherwise rejecting taste buds of people who think of themselves as conservatives. In this respect Romney undoubtedly wins the support of the God-rejecting elitist powers that are using the sham two-party system to manipulate Americans toward a similarly God-rejecting socialist future. As I said in the latest article posted on my blog, "His record suggests that, though he moves toward the objective with a more deceptively alluring style than Obama, Romney will herd Americans more surely and quietly into the stock pens of totalitarian socialism."
From a strictly academic viewpoint, I feel a profound sense of tragic irony as I watch Americans wrestling with the unyielding truth that their character and liberty are being done to death by elite elements that have abandoned the moral and constitutional vision of America's founders. Every day I hear from or meet people grieving for their nation, like members of a close-knit family keeping vigil in their hearts in the last weeks of a beloved parent's life. Others, of course, care about nothing except to divide up the legacy.
In this respect the Democratic Party represents the ones who wouldn't mind at all if someone plunged a knife into the parent's heart. Romney Republicans are those who abhor that messy alternative, preferring instead a gentle poison. But the ones I'm talking about pray to God, as I do, for a miraculous healing; they say to God that they would gladly give of heart and life themselves to be a part of it. The series of articles posted in the last week or so at my blog come from a place of prayer like that. Is that where you are? If so, the series I have written may be good fodder for thought and, God knows, even for action.
To see more articles by Dr. Keyes, visit his blog at LoyalToLiberty.com and his commentary at WND.com and BarbWire.com.
© Alan KeyesThe views expressed by RenewAmerica columnists are their own and do not necessarily reflect the position of RenewAmerica or its affiliates.
(See RenewAmerica's publishing standards.)
