This diary is intended as a polemic, but it is intended as as rational a discourse of which I am capable. The intent is to convince, persuade and adjust the current set of thinking. It is not intended as belittlement or an attack for its own sake. In it, I intend to make the most rational case that I can to support my arguments and will be more than open to rational counter argument. I am including specific reference points for each of my points for ease of reference in the argument.
I. The Case: The Constitution should End.
A. Point: The United States Constitution is a lot of things. It has been called the blue print for our democracy. However, I also argue (convincingly I believe) that it is the symbol of our nation. It is a rather powerful symbol that represents the common points of our society.
B. Point: Due to four decades of non ending propaganda, a significant portion of our society has degraded mentally to the point of being unreachable by reason. They respond to emotion only, and have only the semblance of reason. All attempts to compromise with them have resulted in unmitigated political disaster.
C. Point: The Republican party is dominated by the News Corp propaganda machine, which dictates that talking points of the party rather than the other way around.
D. Point: For democracy to properly function, the minority must be willing to accept the legitimate democratic process of elections and the results of those elections.
E. Point: The right wing minority no longer accepts the legitimacy of results of progressives or moderates winning an election.
F. Point: To date (though not irrevocably so) all progressive or moderate leaders with the power to do so have let right wing political leaders who have violated the law get away unchallenged and uncharged including Nixon, Reagan, Bush I, Bush II and a significant portion of their cabinet.
G. Point: The right wing views violence as a legitimate method of resolving problems if they do not achieve their goals.
H. Point: The right wing only accepts the portion of the constitution that they like and ignores the part they do not like.
I. Point: The right wing legitimizes the parts of the military they like; calling their soldiers patriots while dismissing veterans that question their motives.
J. Point: The right wing is attempting to take over and corrupt the United States Military.
K. Point: War Crimes are regarded as, if not the worst violation of law, then certainly among the most high.
L. Point: The Constitution is supposed to represent symbolically and in fact, the rule of law.
M. Postulate: Failure to prosecute war crimes degrades the value of the Rule of Law.
N. Postulate: The common bridge of the Constitution as part of the national story is no longer adequate due to the incapability of those on the right to see reason.
O. Postulate: The vast majority of independents and moderates are unwilling to call the right out on its hypocrisy. While polling indicates that things like failure to prosecute war crimes do indeed bother them, their determination to stay 'in the middle' allows for such poll results as considering a vote for the Republican party despite knowing what they will do procedurally once in charge or a willful failure to investigate the consequences thereof.
P. Postulate: If moderates are unwilling to hold Republicans electorally responsible, from a purpose of strengthening our democracy, moderates are no different than Republicans by their willingness to enable their irrational behavior.
Q. Postulate: A symbol with no meaning is a useless, if not harmful symbol.
R. Postulate: Failure of Progressive Leaders, Moderates (though electoral irresponsibility) and Conservatives to hold the Bush Regime (much less earlier conservative leaders) accountable for such high crimes and misdemeanors as Torture and deliberate lies to the populace delegitimizes the Rule of Law and the Symbols they represent.
S. Postulate: Additionally, the United States Senate is an archaic institution specifically designed to represent rural states.
T. Point: The United States constitution is designed to represent the the needs of the States, the People and the Federal Government.
U. Point: The United States Senate has prevented the government, duly elected by the people, to enact widely needed reform for the good of society.
V. Point: Procedurally, and culturally, the United States Senate is almost impossible to reform.
X. Postulate: Given the earlier postulates, the damage to the United States Constitution and the other threads that hold our society together, it is easier to start from scratch rather than attempt to reform the Constitution and simply abolish the senate.
Y. Postulate: Negotiation with people who are not capable of reason, who are willing to use violence, and who are lead by the powerful and wealthy in society whilst the leaders on our side are, almost to a man (or woman) without consistent ethics in time of need, or willing to hold our leaders to account is essentially impossible.
Z. Summary: The situation of our democracy is in dire straights. Without fundamental change to the system, we shall regress to a dark age where emotion, not reason; religion, not science and corporations, not people, dominate our society.
II. Solutions - The Resignation of Barack Obama.
A. Point: Barack Obama is an amazingly accomplished president. He has managed to fight two wars, deal with a depression, deal with an irrational opposition, pass multiple major pieces of legislation and achieve what no one before him had ever truly managed to accomplish - Major medical reform.
B. Point: Symbolically speaking, President Obama represents a significant symbol both as being the first black President but also one of our most intelligent, arguably the most intelligent since Woodrow Wilson.
C. Point: President Obama has shown that he is willing to compromise his own stated values on matters of personal liberty (the FISA capitulation act), personal honor (association with individuals of extremely questionable character such as Rahm Emmanuel or Timothy Geitner) or personal integrity (see below.)
D. Point: President Obama is an accomplished constitutional scholar. While a strained argument could be made that President Bush II could somehow be ignorant of the finer points of violations of the constitution, President Obama could not.
E. Point: President Bush routinely and with almost low level deliberate malice violated the United States Constitution and the principles therin.
F. Point: The office of the President typically represents the leadership of the dominant political party.
G. Point: Historically, efforts by Third Parties might help change the political narrative, but a third place party has never come to power whilst there were two strong and undivided parties. This is beyond doubt true in the United States, and bears significant (though not unbroken) historic precedence internationally as well.
H. Point: Our nation and our civilization are at the brink of destruction from environmental, economic, societal and cultural threats from a wide variety of areas.
I. Postulate: Progressives are the only people rational enough to act and also willing to act to fix these problems.
J. Postulate: A third party is not a viable solution.
K. Postulate: The Office of the President is the only office sufficiently powerful to rally the disparate, independent and extremely diverse factions within the progressive movement whilst still attracting a significant portion of the remaining rational independents.
L. Postulate: The fundamental societal compact of our nation has been broken. The Rule of Law is violated and the strength it provides our civilization is under threat.
M. Postulate: By failing to hold the previous administration accountable, President Obama has shown, despite his numerous accomplishments, that the Rule of Law is not sacrosanct to Progressives and therefore it is sacrosanct to NO ONE. Republicans do not demand it. Independents (though their willingness to reelect Republicans) do not demand it.
N. Postulate: Our current system is flawed, and needs significant reform.
O. Postulate: The President is the best instrument to accomplish this reform.
P. Postulate: The President is unlikely to enact this reform.
Q. Postulate: The 1980 battle between Kennedy and Carter showed the danger of a primary battle in fracturing the party. History shows the likelihood that a primary challenger to President Obama would essentially (though not with certainty) fracture the Democratic party to the point that it would by default elect a Republican president. Therefore, as flawed as he is, if Obama remains in the race and in office, the alternative of an irrational Republican president is far worse.
R. Postulate: The only significant solution to this problem that I can see is the Resignation of President Barack Obama.
S. Point: President Obama is unlikely to want to resign.
T. Point: Unless he voluntarily resigned, significant portions of the Democratic party will feel extremely disenfranchised and be unlikely to vote for the Democratic candidate in the 2012 election, thus by default electing a Republican president.
U. Point: Though flawed, President Obama is a compassionate person that desires the best for this country.
V. Point: While he has proven through his action that he is unwilling to listen to the Progressive Base, he is willing to listen to certain individuals inside of the upper levels of the party.
W. Point: It is unlikely any of them will read this diary. Even if they do, it is extremely unlikely to convince them of what I see as the best course of action to saving our society.
X. Postulate: As unlikely as this diary was to have a useful effect, the stakes are sufficiently high that I felt the need to try at least once.
III. Summary and Conditionals
I am aware that this diary is unlikely to convince anyone of anything. However, I felt the stakes are sufficiently high that I would make the attempt. I am aware of the tradition on Daily Kos of responding to comments, and I am more than willing to do so. However, I want to respond in as unemotional and rational a tone with which I am capable, despite my quickness to anger at what I perceive as injustices in the system and sometimes irrational responses to rational arguments.
Thus, I will, later this evening, kindly respond to any comments that are made to the best I can as rationally as I can. Those responses which appeal to emotion, rather than reason, will be met in kind. This is not from a desire of malice, but a sincere belief that the only response to an emotional appeal is a stronger emotional appeal.
I have great respect for President Obama and for what our Constitution was, despite the fact that in my belief it no longer represents those things. I am sure that there are holes in my reasoning, since I am a human being and therefore flawed; nevertheless, I believe my position on both points to be sufficiently sound that I see no other course of action that will have sufficient strength to meet the needs of our society or the true threats which with we are faced.
I wish you well.
Update: I have fixed the spelling error of the President's name. I agree that is a serious problem when presenting a serious attempt at a serious argument. I'm not responding to any of the comments yet, but given what I've read thus far, none appear to respond to any of the substance of my ideas. I'd like to point out that I am willing to change my mind on a lot of these things. This is an attempt at serious discourse which is largely being met by mockery. I could expect some of that given the misspelling and given the rather radical positions than I'm taking, but I would hope that among 48 responses there is at least someone willing to discuss these things on a level of discourse higher than those shouting at the community center near Ground Zero.
Nevertheless, I will respond in kind, one way or the other later this evening.
Update II: Well I've either attempted to intelligently respond to, or counter insult every single poster here. I apologize if I'm not up for continuing the discourse, but the people who did the insulting really weren't my time (but were amusing to counter insult) and the people of substance have given me a great deal to think about, and it will take some time to consider their opinions.
Sleep well.