Alan Keyes: Horrible Constitutional Scholar

Alan Keye claims that the Declaration of Independence means that President Barack Obama cannot make executive orders. According to Keyes, only God has that power.

By acknowledging the Creator as the arbiter of justice in human affairs, the Declaration set aside the then still prevalent claim that the de facto superiority of the powerful gave them the natural and unchallenged right to rule over all the rest. It made clear that, in God’s will, power alone is not the standard of right. It articulated, for purposes of human government, the understanding that allowed each and every human being to claim the sanction of God’s authority for those actions, necessary for their good and that of all humanity, which the laws of nature and of nature’s God entitled them to undertake.

With this understanding, the Declaration emboldens the relatively weak to stand firm against abuses perpetrated by those who are relatively stronger. When the latter disparage, thwart, usurp or despoil activities entailed by God’s endowment of justice, the Declaration reminds us of the rights to which all who bear the title of humanity have equal claim. Thus emboldened by their consciousness of right, the weak may be moved to stand together, and by their common stand of righteous conscience transform their relative weakness into superior strength, sufficient to repel the abuses perpetrated against them.

There is more.

But in the absence of a due regard for good conscience (i.e., the will to follow the God-endowed inclinations the voice of conscience articulates), the community of strength that constitutes the just powers derived from the consent of the people falls prey to the manipulation of material passion and fear. The powerful obviously have greater resources with which to undertake such manipulation. A de facto government of powers without regard to justice replaces the government of just powers derived from the consent of the governed. This fulfills the expectation expressed in William Penn’s famous dictum: “Those who will not be governed by God will be ruled by tyrants.”

The Declaration of Independence has no bearing on our laws. The Declaration was written by the Founding Fathers to declare independence from the reign of King George III. This is from the Declaration of Independence.

The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

Keyes would have no luck going to the Supreme Court to use the Declaration as basis for impeaching Obama. The Supreme Court has never used the Declaration of Independence as basis for deciding law. The crazy thing is Keyes is actually advocating revolution against the President of the United States. The Declaration was written during the Revolutionary War. The Founding Fathers made it clear that they would continue to engage in warfare if the English didn't honor their wishes.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our Brittish brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

The fact that Keyes would cite a declaration of war as grounds to impeach Obama shows just how insane he is.

Louie Gohmert Compares Sex Education to the Soviet Union

Via Right Wing Watch: Rep. Louie Gohmert is a parody of an elected official. Gohmert is against public schools teaching sex education. I find that interesting since Gohmert has openly discussed the sexual practices of animals. Gohmert spoke on Wall Builders Live with hosts David Barton and Rick Green. Gohmert compared sex education to the Soviet Union.

Let the kids be innocent. Let them dream. Let them play. Let them enjoy their life. You don't have to force this sexuality stuff into their life at such a point. It was never intended to be that way. They'll find out soon enough. And, in fact, ... mankind has existed for a pretty long time without anyone ever having to give a sex-ed lesson to anybody. And now we feel like, oh gosh, people are too stupid to unless we force them to sit and listen to instructions. It's just incredible.

And there is a natural law that parents should be involved in education, they should know about, they should be part of the training - that's a law of nature; Alan Keyes was just talking about it this weekend when we were together. That is such an important part of nature and yet that is the very thing that some of these liberals want to take away.

And it reminds me so much of the summer that I was an exchange student in the Soviet Union back in the Seventies and I was shocked when they were saying 'no, the children don't belong to parents, they belong to the state.' And if any parent said anything in front of their children negative about the wonderful Soviet Union, then we will take their children away and give them to somebody more deserving. And I just thought how horribly shocking that was, that of course parents were the ones who love the children, not the state. And I thought thank God that we don't have that in our country.

And now I've seen this coming with a lady from MSNBC saying "hey, children belong to the state" ... and it just sent chills because it took me back to the Seventies when that's what the Soviet Union used to say and we know how well that worked out.

I find it funny that Gohmert cites Alan Keyes as a source of wisdom. Keyes has denounced his gay daughter and public mocked by other Republican candidates in a 2007 Iowa presidential debate. Wall Builders Live co-host David Barton has been publicly busted for making up false quotes attributed to the Founding Fathers. Barton was also an instructor for Glenn Beck's online school. Gohmert tends to associate himself with Christian Right fundamentalists. This is the real reason he doesn't want sex education in schools.

Quote of the Day: Rush Limbaugh Super-Sized Edition

"The New Deal didn't work. Hoover was President through the depression for one year."

Rush Limbaugh

The Great Depression started in 1929. Franklin Delano Roosevelt was inaugurated in March 1933.

Limbaugh believes Bill Clinton made a law to fund abortions overseas. Population Action states:

The global gag rule does not prohibit foreign NGOs from providing EC as part of the family planning and reproductive health services they offer. Foreign NGOs may provide EC counseling, dispense EC to clients and promote awareness of this contraceptive method and still remain eligible for U.S. population assistance.

The Mexico City Policy (aka gag rule) does is not allow foreign clinics and hospitals to receive U.S funding, if the facilities inform women about contraception and abortion. Limbaugh clearly has no idea what he is talking about.

"If you look the executive orders (Obama) has promised to issue. He's gonna overturn the abortion law that guided who we fund overseas in terms of family planning and that's been a roller coaster. Clinton imposed it. Bush rescinded it. Obama is gonna reimpose it and so forth."

Clinton can not legal impose a law he is rescinding. The gag rule was imposed by Ronald Reagan in 1984. Alan Keyes helped created the gag rule policy. The Bush administration continued to censor what foreign health care facilities could tell their patients about contraception and abortion. Bill Clinton rescinded the gag rule on January 22, 1993.

The end of the video is Limbaugh telling Sean Hannity they have to fight against the "drive-by" media "reporting a totally bunch of wrong libel stuff about people." Limbaugh and Hannity spent their careers in talk radio and television. They have never reported a story in their lives. Getting Hoover's tenure over the Great Depression is historical fact. The Mexico City Policy doesn't prevent foreign countries from using U.S. dollars for funding abortions. (I doubt the Bush administration would be competent enough to monitor where the money was going.) Limbaugh can not have the truth of his side without speaking the truth.

I never hated Limbaugh. When I was a teenager, my father would listen to Limbaugh and his radio show and watch his defunct television show. I found the tv show because Limbaugh spent most of the show plugging his merchandise. I just found Limbaugh dull. Limbaugh was in the right place at the right time.

Interesting fact: Limbaugh and Hannity are both college dropouts. Maybe I should become a conservative talk show host.

Pushing Rope Endorses Alan Keyes For the Republican Nomination

The Florida Progressive Coalition has endorsed John Edwards. Pushing Rope will not endorse any Democratic candidate during the primary. We will endorse a Republican.

No Republican candidate better espouses conservative values better than Alan Keyes. Where George W. Bush failed, Keyes will be able to privatize Social Security with the political collateral gained from the Illinois Senagte race. Keyes shrewdly made Mary Cheney's sexuality a campaign issue. Keyes was wise enough to know that the best way to defeat the popular Barack Obama is going after the Republican Vice-President's daughter.

Alan Keyes: "And they are adopting the paradigm of family life. But the essence of that family life remains procreation. If we embrace homosexuality as a proper basis for marriage, we are saying that it is possible to have a marriage state that in principle excludes procreation and is based simply on the premise of selfish hedonism. This is unacceptable."

Keyes worries that gay adoptive children would have sex with their biological brother and sisters. The ignonant dummies in the audience laugh Keyes logic. Great minds like Keyes were scorned during their lives.



Keyes may not be able to talk in short and coherentsentences. He will woo voters with his golden singing voice.



If Keyes wins the nomination and Obama is his opponent, Keyes already has a big endorsement lined up.

"Christ would not stand idly by while an infant child in that situation died," said Keyes. Sadly, Jesus was one of the few people that voted for Keyes in 2004. Keyes was running even with Ron Paul in the USA Today/Gallup Poll. Lady luck has turned for Keyes.

Pushing Rope proudly endorses Alan Keyes. There is no other GOP candidate we would rather see get the nomination.

Hung like a fox?

For some reason, my post about Keyes campaign has been linked by a blog called "African-American porn stars." I'm not kidding! Perhaps they know something we don't about "Johnny Keyes"...

Keyesian Revival? Not quite.

Being an educated American who's interested in politics and keeps up on current events, I thought I knew who all the presidential candidates were -- no matter how obscure. Hell, I even knew that John Cox has been in the race since March. But Alan Keyes? Alan M-Fing Keyes? Where the hell did he come from? And where did his beard go? And did he lose like 50 pounds or something? Keyes may be many things, but he's not a master campaigner if, by this week, he's only caught the attention of Americans like myself.

So when did Keyes start his quixotic run for president? Technically September, though he start pushing out feelers a month earlier, as TPM notes with a little irony: "Apparently there's a spontaneous grassroots movement to draft Alan Keyes into the GOP primary race -- oddly enough, the movement has emerged on Keyes' own website."

In the Keyes press release that TPM linked to, Keyes stipulates his conditions for undertaking another run at the White House: "Keyes — who in 2000 drew 14 percent in the Iowa Caucus and averaged 16 percent in his best ten states during the presidential primaries — says he is open to the possibility of running, if enough support exists at the grassroots for his candidacy." The aforementioned John Cox placed 11 in the Iowa Straw Poll, and Keyes..? Keyes didn't even have a place on the poll, since Cox came in dead last. So I guess Keyes sort of flip-flopped on his position about running for president.

And Keyes lack of support continues, unless you count the 2% he received in a Des Moines Register poll. I found three MySpace pages for Keyes, none with over 400 friends (the "official" Keyes MySpace page has 36 friends -- how lonely.) As for his website, there aren't many people on there if his forums are in any way indicative of the traffic he receives. His forums pages lists how many people are online. Obviously, this number varies every few minutes, but I haven't seen it peek over a hundred since I discovered his forums site a few hours ago. The super majority of those visitors are listed as "guests," not registered users. I know something about those guests -- most of them, I'm willing to bet, are spam bots. Judging from my experience administraing the domain of my former blog, loadedmouth.com, I can tell you that most of the time my site had at least a hundred "guests" online, but they weren't actual people. I know this because I had to manage thousands of spam comments flooding in each week from these "guests." So if 100 guests equaled five actual users online at loadedmouth.com (which it often did), the same equation works for Keyes's website, too. Which means that hardly anybody is reading it -- "hardly" in terms of the interest that a presidential candidate needs to generate, at least.*

As for his ballot access, I was surprised to learn that Keyes is on the ballot in 13 states. In four states, he bought his way onto the ballot; in other states, I assume he got signatures. Like iin Tennessee, where a candidate needs 275 signatures to get on the ballot; and Washington state, where is bar is set a bit higher at 1000 signatures. So, still, we're not talking any real popular support here.

So, thus far, that's the history of Keyes 2008 presidential campaign -- and I doubt there will be much more to add beyond this. After learning all of this, the question I've had since seeing Keyes in the debate still begs: what the hell was he doing there?

* - There's a possibility that my estimates on the people viewing Keyes website are wrong, If so, and if the number of "guests" are taken at face value as actual people, it's still not many people.

Alan Keyes Speak: A Language No One Understands

Like eeveryone else: Andrew Sullivan wonders how the hell did Alan Keyes got in the recent Iowa debate? Sullivan points out this bizarre exchanfe Keyes had with the moderator.

“Ambassador, I’m going to ask you one more time. Have you personally been doing campaign events here in Iowa in the last few months?”

“I have had several campaign events here in Iowa, but I will not define those events as you do,” he said.

“In the last few months?”

“I don’t define those events as you do."

Keyes response reminds me of Bill Clinton asking for the definition of the word is.

Tas wondered if Keyes is even on the ballot in any state.

If Keyes wants to play, he's got a right to run, but to be elevated on the same stage with candidates who -- like'em or not -- have put actual effort into their campaigns is a travesty. Before Keyes debate, somebody should have asked "Where's his organization? Supporters? Donaters? Hell, does he have a campaign office?"

The fact that the American Enterprise Institute let Keyes and John Bolton through the door says much about the think tank.

Update: I confused Barack Obama with Alan Keyes in a sentence. I will make sure that never happens again.

To answer Tas's question: Keyes and Bolton both have been members of AEI. I doubt AEI got Keyes into the debate.

Alan Keyes At the Iowa Debate

Watching this video convinces me that Alan Keyes is only running is because he loves the sound of his voice. Keyes constantly goes over the timeline.

This is what Keyes stands for:

A Christian God is needed to teach reading, math, and science.

Abolishing the income tax.

Sealing up the borders. Actually, he just means the Mexican border. Keyes won't come out say say he is xenophobic.

Protecting the right of the unborn. I'm sure that includes stem cells in petri dishes.

What I think is a lot of folks out there ought to understand that what you're watching represents the situation of our country. Ask yoursef who represents the people that they don't let you hear from and you know who you should vote for in the Iowa caucus. Who represents the voice that theyre absolutely determined to overlook in the discussion of our sovernty and the betrayal of this people's sovernty, on the border, on our moral principles, on our major export overseas which is our jobs.

These folks represent the very elite who year after year after year have destroyed our Constitution...

The moderator then attempts to cut Keyes off. Not once did Keyes address global warming in his tirade. Go to 3:15 of the video to view the insanity.

Great Moments In Conservative Punditry

Peer Review is always good for the occasional comedy masterpiece. Mr. G's praise for Alan Keyes is a gem.

As I've mentioned on numerous occasions before, I am a HUGE Keyes fan. There is currently no other candidate I would rather vote for than Alan Keyes. He is a man of character, conviction and brilliance as well as a tremendous communicator.

If coming off as crazy means great communication skills than Mr. G is correct. This exchange with Mike Signorile is the kind of bigotry that scares people away from the GOP.

Mike Signorile: "So Mary Cheney is a selfish hedonist, is that it?"

Alan Keyes: "Of course she is. That goes by definition. Of course she is."

Mike Signorile: "I don't think Dick Cheney would like to hear that about his daughter."

Alan Keyes: "He may or may not like to hear the truth, but it can be spoken."

Alan Keyes carpetbagged in Illinois and got trounced by Barack Obama. The latter won 70 percent of the popular vote. Keyes called Obama a "socialist and a liar" and that Jesus Christ would not vote for Obama. Keyes ignores the fact that Christ did not meddle in political affairs of the Roman Empire.

Would Jesus approve of Keyes throwing his lesbian daughter Maya out of the house?

Now Maya Keyes -- liberal, lesbian and a little lost -- finds herself out on her own. She says her parents -- conservative commentator and perennial candidate Alan Keyes and his wife, Jocelyn -- threw her out of their house, refused to pay her college tuition and stopped speaking to her.

Maya, 19, says her parents cut her off because of who she is -- "a liberal queer." Tomorrow, she will take her private dispute with her dad into the open. She is scheduled to make her debut as a political animal, speaking at a rally in Annapolis sponsored by Equality Maryland, the state's gay rights lobby.

This is the kind of candidate the Peer Review crowd wants. Are the majority of Americans hedonists or do they find Keyes repulsive? Mr. G should answer that question for his readers.