Ignoring Collective Wisdom

February 26, 2014

Ignoring Collective Wisdom

James Longstreet

 

Corrupted by flattery and a ranking member of the mutual admiration society, Mr. Obama rides his “unicorn of intellect” through these next few years, the balance of his second term.

 

His “punch list” is now being implemented with the assistance of his Attorney General, both of whom seem born from some angry mother of retribution.

 

It seems we are getting too much Frank Davis, not enough James Madison.

 

Waive the Federal Laws that are impediments to the agenda.  Waiver out those who are on “our team” from unjust and unforeseen burdens of hurried and bad legislation.  Craft agency-sourced regulation that hamstrings those whom we wish hobbled. Sue the unfriendly States. Circumvent the document to which allegiance has been sworn. Display contempt for the limits of government and the system of checks and balances outlined by the document that you have declared yourself an expert.

History does not always repeat, it has been said, but it often rhymes.

Edmund Burke, a member of Parliament for nearly 30 years in the 18th Century, identified conditions and characteristics of government and politics which are in full display and implementation today.

Rather than shroud oneself in the certitude and conceit so currently prevalent, he suggested that leaders should comport a modicum of humility. “I set out with a perfect distrust of my own abilities; a total renunciation of every speculation of my own; and with a profound reverence for the wisdom of our ancestors, who have left us the inheritance of so happy a constitution (not the USC) and so flourishing an empire.”

(Writings: 3, 139)

The “elites” of today fashion themselves above all and all that came before them.  They craft legislation so grand that it need not be read before voting, and need not be digested until passed.

Burke also offered this nugget:

“To approach the constitution (not in reference to the USC) as the radicals do, with an eye to measuring it against a speculative theory and no inherent regard for its established forms, is to prefer one’s reason over the collective wisdom of generations of one’s countrymen.”

Yes. Those powder-wigged, silk-stockinged men who framed the United States Constitution did so after studying generations and centuries of governments from around the world.  They were not merely senior lecturers.  They embraced previous wisdoms and collected them as treasure.

This current certitude derived from flattery, and driven by the agenda that casts aside “collective wisdoms” from generations of “one’s countrymen” seems of no matter to the Obama administration.  All that came before appears to be regarded more as craftsmanship from evil predecessors rather than wise fellow countrymen.  Such an attitude must have a curious history, right Frank?

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