Napper's Snapper: Could We Be So Constituted?

Another conservative friend of mine — Electra, not Anon E. Mouse — sent me a very interesting email a few days ago. With the boss away on vacation this week (ditto one of three sub-bosses, too), I was able to ponder it a bit at work. It's deserving of a fuller response (and Spartacus has said he'll have a look at it himself), so now there'll be yet another topic I'll get tied up in for a while. 

I forwarded this email around a bit of a cross-section of folks I know: some family, Ben and Hugo (one's a non-touchy-feely Democrat, the other seems to be more of a Libertarian), Anon (no reply!?), Spartacus, and so forth. First, let's have Electra's email (with no — shudder! — corrections to grammar, punctuation, and spelling); I'll follow it up with the response I emailed out. Spartacus, you can chime in anytime. I plan to research that Napper fellow a bit further, too, and give more background. 

Sent: Tuesday, April 10, 2007 8:28 AM
Subject: RW Preamble 

NEW PREAMBLE TO THE CONSTITUTION

This is probably the best e-mail I've seen in a long, long time.

The famed "Bill of No Rights" was written in 1993 by Lewis Napper, a self-described amateur philosopher from Mississippi who ran for a U.S. Senate seat in 2000 as a Libertarian. Personally, this guy should run for President!

"We the sensible people of the United States, in an attempt to help everyone get along, restore some semblance of justice, avoid more riots, keep our nation safe, promote positive behavior, and secure the blessings of debt-free liberty to ourselves and our great-great-great-grandchildren, hereby try one more time to ordain and establish some common sense guidelines for the terminally whiny, guilt ridden, delusional, and other bed-wetter's. We hold these truths to be self evident: that a whole lot of people are confused by the Bill of Rights and are so dim they require a Bill of NON-Rights."

ARTICLE I: You do not have the right to a new car, big screen TV, or any other form of wealth. More power to you if you can legally acquire them, but No one is guaranteeing anything.

ARTICLE II: You do not have the right to never be offended. This country is based on freedom, and that means freedom for everyone -- not just you! You may leave the room, turn the channel, express a different opinion, etc.; but the world is full of idiots, and probably always will be.

ARTICLE III: You do not have the right to be free from harm. If you stick a screwdriver in your eye, learn to be more careful; do not expect the tool Manufacturer to make you and all your relatives independently wealthy.

ARTICLE IV: You do not have the right to free food and housing. Americans are the most charitable people to be found, and will gladly help anyone in need, but we are quickly growing weary of subsidizing generation after generation of professional couch potatoes who achieve nothing more than the Creation of another generation of professional couch potatoes. (This one is my pet peeve...get an education and go to work. Don't expect everyone else to take care of you!)

ARTICLE V: You do not have the right to free health care. That would be nice, but from the looks of public housing, we're just not interested in public health care.

ARTICLE VI: You do not have the right to physically harm other people. If you kidnap, rape, intentionally maim, or kill someone, don't be surprised if the rest of us want to see you fry in the electric chair.

ARTICLE VII: You do not have the right to the possessions of others. If you rob, cheat, or coerce away the goods or services of other citizens, don't be surprised if the rest of us get together and lock you away in a place where you still won't have the right to a big screen color TV or a life of leisure.

ARTICLE VIII: You do not have the right to a job. All of us sure want you to have a job, and will gladly help you along in hard times, but we expect you to take advantage of the opportunities of education and vocational training laid before you to make yourself useful.

ARTICLE IX: You do not have the right to happiness. Being an American means that you have the right to PURSUE happiness, which by the way, is a lot easier if you are unencumbered by an over abundance of idiotic laws created by those of you who were confused by the Bill of Rights.

ARTICLE X: This is an English speaking country. We don't care where you are from, English is our language. Learn it or go back to wherever you came from!

ARTICLE XI: You do not have the right to change our country's history or heritage. This country was founded on the belief in God. And yet, you are given the freedom to believe in any religion, any faith, or no faith at all; with no fear of persecution. The phrase IN GOD WE TRUST is part of our heritage and history, and if you are uncomfortable with it, TOUGH!!!! 

So I responded as follows (and Electra seemed unoffended afterward); I was rather time-rushed, though: 

Sent: Tuesday, April 10, 2007 9:50 AM
Subject: FW: RW Preamble

This comes from a conservative friend (i.e., ranting on the other end of the political spectrum from me). Largely I concur… although parts of it seem to grate just a bit on me — besides leaving little leeway for strokes of compassion, it also provides no guidelines on exactly how we are to "secure the blessings of debt-free liberty". And what would be government's role? How would it be funded? What are its limitations domestically? Overseas? What about national defense? Catastrophic natural disasters? What checks and balances? 

One sample hole I see: if government is to be severely curtailed (I believe that's an objective of both Libertarians and your run-of-the-mill American conservative), who maintains the infrastructure? Would it be the states? Then be warned: if you devolve a lot of the responsibilities of a federal government down to the state level, the issue of paying for these services becomes critical: how will they, the states, raise the funds? Short-sighted legislatures — both federal and state — have been cutting into education and health to be able to pay for other services. This is suicidal to society; funding for education and health care should be expanded… or our grandchildren will be sickly morons. 

I'm okay with the concept of a pay-as-you-go highways-system to pull in revenue for maintenance and even expansion of said infrastructure… although the condition of the Pennsylvania Turnpike has me snickering at how well such a venture is likely to turn out. Will someone oversee that toll-booth payers aren't being gouged? Then you've either added a layer back into your bureaucracy, or given more work to a pool of hungry lawyers. 

Article V I disagree with. Today we do have a reasonably well maintained roads-infrastructure in most states and regions. So why can't we have free health care? Pay-as-you-go sounds okay here… but what about your retired, widowed aunt, who's living on her retirement income and a small pension, and who suddenly is found to have leukemia? How is she to pay for her treatment? A system to spread such costs among some 200 million income-earning Americans would make it possible — but it would also need to be regulated… and there again is another layer of bureaucracy. 

Another problem with shifting responsibilities from the federal to the state level would be that strong, issue-driven state legislatures might just decide to secede and become their own country/ies. Granted, if Alabama decided it wanted to be a separate country, the impact (other than to the national psyche) might be minimal. How about if California — with an economy bigger and more robust than all but some half-dozen of all the world's nations — decided to leave the union? Would it be the state's "right"? Why not? Who would stop them? 

Article X I concur with… but it ignores the historical fact that we are "an English[-]speaking country" only by reason of conquest, not acclimation. The Article implies that those who preceded us to this land have fewer rights if they prefer their Algonquian, Tlingit, Shawnee, Narragansett, Cherokee, and so on. Should we escort them all back up the west coast and across the Bering Strait? Or toss Hawaii's native Polynesians into the Pacific? 

Regardless; there's much to ponder here — and the opportunity to engage in a vigorous political dialog/debate is one of our cornerstones and liberties. This one should trigger that cornerstone big-time… 

Regards,
AgingChild

I once used that Article-Ten question directly on Electra (no, of course that's not her real name). I asked her in passing, "Do you speak any Spanish?" She and her husband — both coworkers of mine — are incredibly renaissance-types, in that there is a staggeringly broad range of talent and brains between the two of them. He can sew incredible wedding-dresses and make beautiful cakes; she is a published author (yes, I have a copy), knows her way around under a car's hood and chassis, plays handbells, sings, and so on. I believe they're both former Navy-medical. 

Electra looked at me coolly. "No," she answered, "I speak American." 

I tossed back at her (some weeks later, I admit), "Which 'American' do you mean? Cherokee? Cheyenne? Sioux? Navajo?" 

She laughed. "Good one!"

Followup… this posting actually got a comment:

Asher Heimermann Apr 17, 2007

What are you talking about?

AgingChild Apr 18, 2007

Shalom aleikhem, Asher; welcome to MT2mb.

Well, one of the things I do on my blog is pounce on conservatives! Lewis Napper wrote a poorly-thought-out, shallow, bigoted, simplistic piece on how to rewrite the introduction to our almighty Constitution in such a way that it would favor his "put up, or shut up" approach to dealing with other people's needs and aims — yet in Article XI he firmly declares, "[y]ou do not have the right to change our country's history or heritage"!

So when a conservative friend sent me that rant, I couldn't leave it alone, or delete it, and instead answered (copying friends from all over the political spectrum; only one responded… oh, well) with my own responses, addressing some of the holes and other shaky underpinnings. I might just track down his website (not that I'm greatly interested in doing so), and send it to him directly. On second thought, that WOULD be a bit fun… something like poking at a touchy bulldog through a picket fence!

Open-minded people of all ilks should have a broad range of friends and associates. I'm spiritual and liberal; so are some of my friends, while others are fundamentalist, agnostic, Jewish, Muslim, even more liberal, conservative, young, old, etc. I learn from each of them — I give them opportunities to express their viewpoints and feelings, and they seem to respect me enough to do the same… although most of them are so entrenched in their beliefs (spiritual, political, or whatever else) that their minds change rarely.

Anyway, I did manage — though respectfully and humorously — to give that particular conservative friend a dose of her own medicine by throwing a philosophical elephant through one of the many loopholes in her rationale; she laughed it off, and has kept her bigoted outlook. She's also a very nice woman overall, and I like her.

Thanks for stopping by; hope the topics aren't too dizzying!