Lies the government told you (11 page)

The contested 2000 presidential election involved a series of legal proceedings. For the purpose of this discussion, we’ll pick up the story in early December 2000. At this point, the Secretary of State of Florida, Katherine Harris, had certified the election for Governor Bush. On December 4th 2000, in the case of
Gore v. Harris
, a local judge in Tallahassee, Florida, upheld Harris’s certification, and rejected any further recounts, concluding that a recount would make no difference. Gore appealed to the Florida Supreme Court, which on December 8th, ordered a manual recount of all “undervotes” that had not yet been counted. An “undervote” in the context of this case was a ballot where the counting machine failed to register a preference in the race. Approximately 60,000 Florida undervotes were outstanding at this time. Bush then appealed to the United States Supreme Court, asking the Court to stay the recount. The Court, ruling by 5 to 4, granted the stay and heard oral arguments on the merits of the case on December 11th. On December 12th, the Supreme Court decided, again 5 to 4, to stop the recounts because the standards applied in the recounts were not uniform across the state, and would result in unequal treatment of votes and thus fundamental unfairness.
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The Court’s decision to hear this case stemmed from the majority’s political affiliation; their self-interest in the election cannot be denied. Each of the five justices in the majority, to different extents, was affiliated, or had been affiliated, with the Republican Party. Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, a native Arizonan, is a Republican who typically referred to Republicans as “we” and “us.”
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She served three terms in the Arizona State Senate and also served as co-chairperson of the Arizona state committee to elect Richard Nixon president.
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O’Connor was also an old friend of the Bush family.
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She played tennis with Barbara Bush, and admired George W. Bush.
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In fact, she spent election night at a party hosted by Republicans, and was heard saying, “This is terrible,” when the networks had called the election for Gore.
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According to her husband, Sandra was ready to retire to Arizona, but did not want to give up her seat to a Democratic president.
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Chief Justice William Rehnquist campaigned for Barry Goldwater in 1964, and in 1962, provided legal advice to Republicans working to challenge Democratic voters’ credentials at a Phoenix, Arizona, polling station.
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Justice Anthony Kennedy was considered a “Sacramento lawyer-lobbyist,” who voluntarily traveled the State of California campaigning for then-Governor Ronald Reagan’s anti-tax initiative.
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Justice Clarence Thomas’s wife worked for the Heritage Foundation, a conservative organization, to manage Bush’s transition to the White House.
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Two of Justice Antonin Scalia’s sons worked for law firms representing George W. Bush.
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I mean this thumbnail personal, political history not as an assault on the Republican members of the Court, some of whom—at this writing—I am privileged to call personal friends. And I cannot overlook the pre-judicial Democratic political activities of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Justice Stephen Breyer. And I am mindful of the incendiary admission of Justice William O. Douglas that “up there [at the Supreme Court] no one is neutral.”
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Nevertheless, whether the justices’ intentions were good or bad, pure or impure, constitutional or political,
Bush v. Gore
was an assault on federalism and freedom.

The justices’ political motivation was also evident from the decision itself. Conservative judges typically claim to have a strong belief in the concept of federalism, and want us to believe that they will exercise deference to state governments when applicable. They also tend to assail liberal “activist” judges for not practicing judicial restraint and essentially legislating from the bench. Here, however, the conservatives acted out of character. Until
Bush v. Gore
, neither the Supreme Court, nor any other federal court, had ever enforced a uniformity rule in the counting of ballots.
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Furthermore, every State has varying methods of casting and counting votes; this issue was not unique to Florida. Florida election law required that the votes be counted to determine the “intent of the voter.” The Florida Supreme Court, perhaps somewhat haphazardly, ordered manual recounts to ascertain voter intent. (You may recall the “hanging chad” and “pregnant chad” news stories of that time.) The United States Supreme Court, however, essentially overruled the Florida Supreme Court’s determination, claiming the recount process violated the Equal Protection Clause.

The more disturbing part is that the Supreme Court did not seek to remedy the Equal Protection violation. According to the Court, uniform standards could not be set before the federal deadline for Florida to certify its results. The deadline happened to be December 12th, the date on which the decision was rendered. Therefore, the Supreme Court deemed the recounts unconstitutional, yet in the end proceeded to ignore the 60,000 undervotes, rather than allow the Florida Supreme Court to attempt to resolve the situation.

As icing on the cake, the Supreme Court further stated, in its opinion: “Our consideration is limited to the present circumstances, for the problem of equal protection in election processes generally presents many complexities.”
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The Court, however, is not supposed to decide complex issues that involve politics, especially when the State involved in the suit has already made a decision.

Furthermore, no Supreme Court decision is “limited to the present circumstances.” It is true that the Supreme Court decides cases, and does not actively make law, but its decisions establish precedent applicable to future cases. Moreover, even if the Court’s decision did not extend to future circumstances, it did damage to its own legitimacy and the legitimacy of the 2000 presidential election, and disenfranchised 60,000 American voters. And the winner of that election certainly did not confine his exercise of presidential power “limited to the present circumstances.”
Bush v. Gore
literally had limitless effect on the lives of six billion human beings; and the Court ought to have known that.

But Who Really Cares?

The Supreme Court’s decision in
Bush v. Gore
was a travesty, but even if we had discovered the true winner, the two-party system would still dominate American politics, limiting voter choice and the development of third parties.

No matter what they say, Democrats and Republicans in the United States do not control the government because they are best able to serve us and meet our needs. In fact, both parties couldn’t care less about us. The United States government, as stated earlier, is not a democracy. In fact, some would argue that it is not even a republic, since our leaders do not actually work for us. Some believe that the United States government is actually an oligarchy in which just a few thousand people, “mostly in government, finance, and the military-industrial complex, run
this country for their own purposes.”
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These powerful people seek to preserve their power by manipulating the mainstream media, controlling campaign finance money, and thus nominating candidates who will work for them, regardless of their party affiliation.

Democrats and Republicans, controlled by powerful interests, work to preserve their power. Both parties promote “changing Washington,” but in reality, they like Washington just the way it is: little gets done that they don’t like, and none of our officials are truly held accountable. If we don’t seek to change the system, the Republican Party will always be the party that
claims
it does not want to govern, and the Democratic Party will always
pretend
to govern.

The 2008 presidential election is a great example of the two-party monopoly putting forth two candidates who were substantially the same. Senator John S. McCain, a “Republican” from Arizona, and Senator Barack Obama, a “Democrat” from Illinois, spoke
ad naseum
about the “fundamental disagreements” between them. After following the campaign closely, listening to the speeches, and watching the debates, it was still difficult for me to come up with issues on which the two candidates truly disagreed. Both candidates oppose gay marriage, at least so long as they are politicians. Obama hoped that the Iraq War would end during his presidency, while McCain ran on the idea that the “surge” was working. President Obama currently has plans to shift American involvement in Iraq to Afghanistan.

Both candidates supported bigger and more powerful government; not just Obama. McCain stated that he supported “smaller” government, but chose to “suspend” his campaign in September 2008 (He did no such thing; it was a PR stunt) after the fall of Lehman Brothers, Fannie Mae, and Freddie Mac, to go to Washington and vote for the first of many massive, bailout packages. That package authorized the borrowing or printing and spending of over one trillion dollars on the same government-motivated, get-rich-quick schemes that produced the crisis.

Both Obama and McCain thought that it would be nice to decrease the national debt, and both viewed lower taxes as better for Americans than higher ones. Moreover, I do not think the Federal Reserve Bank was discussed publicly even once by either candidate during the campaign, let alone plans to audit, reform, or abolish it.

They both approved TARP funds for struggling companies and supported the federal takeover of education, Medicare prescription drug benefits, and the burdensome Sarbanes-Oxley Act.

Moreover, Obama and McCain
still
endorse the unconstitutional, liberty-restricting Patriot Act, which, while not making us safer, invades our natural rights. Both candidates opposed the legalization of marijuana, although Obama stated he was open to the use of marijuana for medicinal purposes.

On abortion, Obama and McCain seemingly disagreed. Obama is pro-choice, and believes that having an abortion is “one of the most fundamental rights we possess.”
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McCain claims to oppose abortion. Throughout the campaign, he denounced the Supreme Court’s decision in
Roe v. Wade
, and vowed to nominate Supreme Court justices who would overturn it. Yet, in August 1999, McCain stated, “[C]ertainly in the short term, or even in the long term, I would not support repeal of
Roe v. Wade
, which would then force X number of women in America to undergo illegal and dangerous abortions.”
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I do not doubt that McCain is personally pro-life, but his stance against abortion is not nearly as realistic as his campaign made it out to be.

In selecting their running mates, both Obama and McCain chose candidates whom they hardly knew. John McCain asked then-Governor Sarah Palin of Alaska to be his running mate just six months after meeting her for the first time.
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Before inviting her to his home in Sedona, Arizona, to offer her the job formally, McCain had only spoken to Palin once on the phone about the position.
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Obama, who had only been a Senator for two years prior to the start of his presidential campaign, chose veteran Senator Joe Biden as his running mate. The two colleagues appeared to be good friends, but it is clear that Obama picked the experienced Biden merely to counter his image as a young, naïve candidate.

We did not hear about the similarities between the two candidates, however, because the campaign was not about real issues that matter to people. I think we will remember Reverend Jeremiah Wright much better than Obama’s proposed healthcare plan. At one point during the campaign, it seemed for a moment that William Ayers was Obama’s running mate. We will all remember that John McCain has more than one house, but most likely fewer than ten.

When it was all said and done, America voted for Obama not because of where he stood on the issues, but because he was not a Republican, and he had the ability to captivate his audiences. America voted for change, but neither Obama nor future Democratic or Republican candidates will disrupt the current two-party monopoly in this country. In the end, the ruling parties preserved their power.

Campaigns do not have to be about real issues because the colossal Democratic and Republican Parties have adopted them all. It may help to think of them as huge superstores that have everything you could ever want. They cover all the issues, but just frame them a bit differently. In the end, no matter how you slice it, the two-party system in this country ensures that we more or less maintain the status quo.
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The people getting shut out of the system are candidates who limit their campaigns to the issues, and the voters, who more often than not choose the lesser of two evils. Due to the two-party monopoly, third parties, like the Libertarian and Green Parties, are perceived as radical, fringe groups with no chance of success. Ralph Nader was ostracized by the Democrats for helping George W. Bush win the 2000 election, rather than commended for opposing the “Republocrat”
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regime.

Congressman Ron Paul is a “Republican” for the purpose of running for office because it would be unwise for him to label himself a “Libertarian.” Paul ran for president in 2008 as a Republican, even though he shares little in common with the present Grand Old Party. People around the country have come to know Ron Paul as a libertarian and constitutionalist because he, unlike mainstream politicians, speaks his mind truthfully, understands our financial systems dutifully, and follows the Constitution faithfully.

Congressman Paul also suffered from an institutional preference for mainstream candidates. The last major presidential candidate who loved the Constitution and ran offering to shrink the federal government was Senator Barry M. Goldwater (R-AZ) in 1964. Even though Ron Paul raised more campaign dollars in one day— over five million dollars on November 5th 2007—than any other candidate, the Republican Party establishment and much of the national media labored mightily against him.