God-like Pride. Another BYU OpEd
"They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety." -Benjamin Franklin
A brilliant contradictionalist wrote in today's paper:
"I adamantly insist that United States Constitutional rights legally must and morally should be preserved only for legal United States citizens and that only they may make an appeal to those rights. I do hold simultaneously the belief that all mankind are eligible to receive those God-given rights, if they act in accordance to the requirements that all U.S. citizens are under obligation to fulfill. We should strictly avoid any inhumane or degrading practice that would tarnish our own morality as well as our standing in the world scene. However, any concession or right afforded foreign enemy combatants must not fall under Constitutional rights, which are reserved for American citizens, whose rights for “life liberty and the pursuit of happiness” begin with the right to live."
Note: He believes "that all mankind are eligible" for "God-given rights, if they act in accordance to the requirements. . ."
I don't think he understands the meaning of "God-given."
Or perhaps he thinks the U.S. has a direct line to the Almighty, so that we can change and annul His decrees at will.
God has given them, and only He has the right to take them away. We cannot take them from others without soon losing them for ourselves, according to the justice of God.
I'll assume that his inclusion of "the right to live" as a constitutional right for U.S. citizens was simply a rhetorical flourish that the student put down, without understanding its meaning, to give his argument a strong ending. Because, if he truly believed "the right to live" were exclusively an American right, he would be a proponent of tyranny, not democracy.
Update: The author told me he wrote it in a hurry. It's a valid excuse for nutty statements. I write my best posts before I've had time to think them through.
Another Update: Jerry wrote in a comment:
May we kindly keep this an honest discussion of the issues rather than using misleading quotes or assumptions of those with opposing views? If you were more truthful, your “update” would have said “the author told me that he had a ½ hour notice for the deadline to submit this piece and that he was unable to address all issues and aspects of the subject.” Perhaps you could have at least finished with the disclaimer for your blog that you gave me in our conversation: “I'm kind of a jerk, and a left-wing nut-job.”
Of course, for those of you who read this blog, stating that I'm a left-wing nut-job would be redundant.
A brilliant contradictionalist wrote in today's paper:"I adamantly insist that United States Constitutional rights legally must and morally should be preserved only for legal United States citizens and that only they may make an appeal to those rights. I do hold simultaneously the belief that all mankind are eligible to receive those God-given rights, if they act in accordance to the requirements that all U.S. citizens are under obligation to fulfill. We should strictly avoid any inhumane or degrading practice that would tarnish our own morality as well as our standing in the world scene. However, any concession or right afforded foreign enemy combatants must not fall under Constitutional rights, which are reserved for American citizens, whose rights for “life liberty and the pursuit of happiness” begin with the right to live."
Note: He believes "that all mankind are eligible" for "God-given rights, if they act in accordance to the requirements. . ."
I don't think he understands the meaning of "God-given."
Or perhaps he thinks the U.S. has a direct line to the Almighty, so that we can change and annul His decrees at will.
God has given them, and only He has the right to take them away. We cannot take them from others without soon losing them for ourselves, according to the justice of God.
I'll assume that his inclusion of "the right to live" as a constitutional right for U.S. citizens was simply a rhetorical flourish that the student put down, without understanding its meaning, to give his argument a strong ending. Because, if he truly believed "the right to live" were exclusively an American right, he would be a proponent of tyranny, not democracy.
Update: The author told me he wrote it in a hurry. It's a valid excuse for nutty statements. I write my best posts before I've had time to think them through.
Another Update: Jerry wrote in a comment:
May we kindly keep this an honest discussion of the issues rather than using misleading quotes or assumptions of those with opposing views? If you were more truthful, your “update” would have said “the author told me that he had a ½ hour notice for the deadline to submit this piece and that he was unable to address all issues and aspects of the subject.” Perhaps you could have at least finished with the disclaimer for your blog that you gave me in our conversation: “I'm kind of a jerk, and a left-wing nut-job.”
Of course, for those of you who read this blog, stating that I'm a left-wing nut-job would be redundant.
I would like to begin my comment by thanking you for calling me brilliant, but I must confess that your contradiction was much more crafty and subtle—and phenomenally descriptive of the point I was attempting to convey in my opinion piece:
ReplyDelete"They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety." -Benjamin Franklin
Interpreting this quote with your logic, one would assume that a radical terrorist (who not only gives up but takes away liberty of others) would be the first to “deserve neither liberty nor safety."
If you notice, my piece did not address the treatment of detainees, but addressed Constitutional rights. My purpose was to argue that only legal Americans have American Constitutional rights to Habeas Corpus. That “God-given” right is one that was won for the citizens of this country.
America has by no means a “direct line to the Almighty” as you falsely associate with my arguments. If you want to turn this into a religious argument, you must recognize that God also has laws by which all men must live to receive equal treatment to His promised blessings and that He would prefer one man or group of men to perish than for them to infect the whole world and cause others to perish.
May we kindly keep this an honest discussion of the issues rather than using misleading quotes or assumptions of those with opposing views? If you were more truthful, your “update” would have said “the author told me that he had a ½ hour notice for the deadline to submit this piece and that he was unable to address all issues and aspects of the subject.” Perhaps you could have at least finished with the disclaimer for your blog that you gave me in our conversation: “I'm kind of a jerk, and a left-wing nut-job.”
Cheers,
-Jerry Hale