POLITICAL LABELING IS OUTRAGEOUSLY MISLEADING AND DANGEROUS TO FREEDOM

By Edwin Cooney

For as far back as I can remember, political leaders and their followers have indulged themselves in political labeling. Political labeling is a two-edged sword. Even though many take pride being labeled Liberal, Conservative, or even Fascist or Communist, many others are invariably damaged by it.

Even as it's natural for people to seek and find comfort in an acceptable set of ideas proscribed for the common good, few of our personal agendas are compatible or consistent with their fundamental pronouncements. Here are some examples:

A Conservative wants government, especially the federal government, out of the “free marketplace." At the same time, Conservatives demand that government protect business from its most annoying competitors and detractors including organized labor’s potential striking power.

Liberals, on the other hand, even as they demand the socialization of commerce and industry, resist any regulation by government that limits the practice of what they regard as their legitimate civil rights.

Religious believers agree that Congress should make no law affecting the establishment of religion, but would squawk like hell if the government began taxing churches and other religious institutions.

The National Rifle Association, which is heavily peopled by states’ rights advocates, demands federal support to maintain their right under the Constitution to keep and bear arms in support of a free militia. However, the roar they invariably emit over the mere regulation of any gun would make the biggest and baddest lion envious.

Back in 1976, both mainstream Republicans and Democrats sought to accommodate one another on the question of the right to abortion. The GOP platform suggested that the right to an abortion ought to be a matter for the states. Democratic candidate Jimmy Carter insisted that he would block the spending of federal funds in support of abortions.

Hence, the constitutionality of abortions versus the morality of abortions poisoned our national dialog. Thus, Americans find themselves today labeled as "pro-life" versus, as some insist, “pro-death” adherents. Additionally, pro-life proponents too often deny poor mothers and fathers the taxpayer money that they need to feed the children that pro-life adherents insist must be born.

In 2023, Americans are increasingly faced with the necessity to unite so that they can creatively indulge each others' needs.

I'm not about to be ashamed that as a liberal Democrat I believe that government is a legitimate tool for the benefit of most people. Nor should a Conservative be ashamed in his or her advocacy of the free market or of their advocacy for states' rights.

As I asserted at the outset, both Conservatives and Liberals ought to shamelessly use government as it meets their lawful and social needs. Remember, social needs are human needs.

In a 1911 speech in Pottawatomie, Kansas, former President Theodore Roosevelt insisted for the first time that human needs are superior to property rights. TR had his critics but no one ever called Teddy a Communist and got away with it — if they so dared!

Political labeling is little more than childlike name calling. Unfortunately, it's as American as baseball, apple pie, or Chevrolet.

Words lack precise power unless they mean something. Political labeling doesn't either inform or accurately describe anyone or any group of people. As for baseball, apple pie and even Chevrolet, they're all a matter of taste.

Few people are academically knowledgeable or consistent in their political labeling. Few have read Karl Marx and, in fact, the onset of World War II proved that too few leaders including Churchill and Roosevelt had read Adolf Hitler's Mein Kampf. Had they done that, there might have been no World War II.

I've made my case. Now, it’s your turn!

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY 

ELECT OR DEFEAT TRUMP WITH ALL HANDS ABOVE THE TABLE!

By Edwin Cooney

Without doubt, the 2024 presidential election will be decided in the courts just as much as it will be concluded in local voting booths! In addition to the legal and primary challenges that the 45th President faces in his bid for a second term, some insist that Mr. Trump isn't eligible to be re-elected under the 14th Amendment of the United States Constitution

The 14th Amendment which was ratified on Thursday, July 9th, 1868, a presidential election year, contained Section Three determining the eligibility of those who would seek public office in the wake of the insurrection during the late Civil War. It reads as follows:

No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.

Supporters of the former president insist that Section Three of the Fourteenth Amendment applies solely to post Civil War conditions and circumstances and can’t apply to January 6th, 2021 unless and until those who participated in that event have been duly convicted of insurrection. Reluctantly, I must concur with that sentiment.

Friends of Free Speech for the People, a liberal anti-Trump organization, says that the former president does not have to be found guilty of insurrection by any court to be barred from eligibility for re-election because Section Three specifically empowers a two-thirds vote by each House of Congress to disallow any person's eligibility under that section of the Fourteenth Amendment. Note that a county commissioner in New Mexico was recently removed from office for his participation in the January 6th, 2021 attack on Congress. As I understand it, that occurred only because that commissioner was convicted of insurrection due to his participation in the January 6th, 2021 riot against Congress.

Men and women of both knowledge and brilliance will of course debate this matter long after the election of 2024 is history. However, I'm not convinced that without clear and defined constitutional authority, Mr. Trump ought to be deprived of his constitutional right for re-election. 

To me, Donald John Trump lacks the capacity to be either a Republican or a conservative. His disregard for everything and everyone separate from his personal whims makes him ineligible as a respectable political entity. As for the seven or eight other Republican candidates, they're only dangerous to the extent that they endorse Mr. Trump's disregard for others. Donald Trump is a thoroughly self-centered and self-aggrandizing person who recognizes no one else's prerogatives other than his own! That is why it is so hard for this observer to understand how some friends for whom I have much respect and affection can even consider voting for him.

Yes, as of this hour, Donald Trump can legitimately be re-elected President of the United States of America in 2024. However, that doesn't in the least mean that he ought to be!

RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,

EDWIN COONEY