Mandatory Sequester comment . . .

Remember that around a year ago, President O said that he would veto any congressional attempt to avoid the sequester of funds, which he demanded?

Nah, they didn't think you would.

For the last six years (that includes Bush, doncha know, but doesn't exclude Obama) the American population has suffered continual erosion of their family budgets, both through price increases, like gasoline, and through loss of revenue, from job losses and income reductions.  And our federal rulers can't find a way to reduce expenses and are yelping about national disaster in the form of a mere 1 or 2 percent reduction in spending?  When spending already exceeds income by a hell of a lot more? 

The sequester would be a decent first step towards resolving the problem, even though insufficient in and of itself.  And it won't be a disaster, that is, it won't be a disaster unless it is implemented disastrously to punish the impertinence of people who don't think that increased government spending must be supported in any and all cases and by any means possible.

We have fallen in amongst bandits.

Should we start looking for cover? . . .

Last year our government bought, according to published information, 1.2 billion rounds of hollow point ammunition.  That's not our military; that's government civilian agencies like Social Security Administration and the Internal Revenue Service.  Simple math tells us that there are multiple rounds for every man, woman and child in the U.S. 

And your little dog Toto, too.

Wonder if our government masters are planning to do something they expect will seriously arouse the citizen subjects?

State of the Union Speech . . .

Oh, this guy is go-o-od!  Slick can get it done, can't he?

I mean, when you watch and listen to the speech, it sounds really terrific.  There are points where you feel like standing up and cheering.

But then when you read the speech, and you are restricted to the cold, hard logic of English sentence structure --  he repeatedly contradicts himself, that is, when what he is saying isn't actually nonsense or false to fact. 

But it truly sounds so good, doesn't it?  'What we have, here, is a seamless blend of "finally, somebody who gets it,"  with "this guy just doesn't get it."

I guess that's why commentators have termed him, "magnetic."  He has a positive, attractive pole and a negative, repulsive pole.  All in one.

These people perturb me off . . . mightily . . .

The currently fashionable snark of the right hand side of the political spectrum is to refer to people on the left as "low-information voters." Well, guess what.  There's low information voters on both sides, and in far greater numbers than there should be. 

But that isn't the real problem.  An absence of information can be corrected.  It's bad information that is the problem.  And where does the bad information come from?  News media just publishes stuff.  It normally doesn't create the stuff it publishes.  (The key word is "normally.")

When it comes to politics, the news media gets the information from the political people  - the politicians and all their operatives, suckups, agents and cronies.  The truth isn't in them.  Right and left, blue and red, conservative and liberal, fat cats and wellfare pimps, bullies and whores, big and small government believers, all of them, with the constant 24/7/365 spin, "analysis", and polls, are responsible for the fantastic, bad information breathlessly published, also 24/7/365,  by the news media.

Is there anybody left who isn't convinced, by now, that except for the religious terrorists in the middle east, the source of all the problems and challenges facing us is Washington D.C., and all the state capitol buildings?

I hereby move that it be resolved that we relentlessly present all politicians with nothing but disrespect, sarcasm, mockery and contempt.  It shouldn't be hard to do and we get plenty of opportunity.

They've earned it.

Separation of Economy and State.. . .

It's become popular in certain self-satisfied circles to justify disregard of constitutional considerations by pointing out that the writers of the constitution just couldn't know how the world would change and couldn't craft a political document that created a government capable of dealing with the modern world.

Well, the constitution does, after all, provide for amending the document.  So to say that the writers of the constitution couldn't provide for the future is disingenuous, verging on deceptive.  They planned for what they couldn't know of the future, by providing a way for the future to amend the document as it would later appear necessary.

In fact, the document was amended almost immediately, for fear that government busybodies would ignore the rights of a free people.  And there was historical justification for doing so, for example, freedom of and from religion leading to a clear separation of church and state.  These early Americans had seen first hand religious persecution and government interference with religious affairs, and they were close in time to crusades pitting Christianity against Islam.  They knew of executions based on religious beliefs and forced conversions, and the dreaded Inquisition.  So, the clear separation of church and state was imposed in response to a known danger of government, as they knew it to be.

Now, we live in modern times, and we see more of the damages a powerful government can do.  We know better, now, in ways our constitutional fathers could not know.  When our smug and self-loving social critics complain that the constitution is outdated, they are probably right.  We know now of a government threat not apparent to the framers of the constitution given the body of information they had, at the time.  We need another amendment to the constitution.

I think we need a clear separation of church and the economy.  No "stimulus" of the economy.  No price supports.  No commodity boards.  No "investment" in businesses.  No security regulations.  No tax-exempt activities or tax breaks to encourage business activity.  No interference to settle labor disputes, other than to respond to criminal activity or breach of the peace.  No federal banking regulations -- federal "reserve" bank.  No picking of "winners and losers."  None of it.  Government is not good at business and the economy, and much too frequently government activity pretextually in aid of the economy amounts to powerful politicians rewarding friends for favors, or spending public moneys on pet projects featuring fat doses of self -aggrandizement.  So.  None of it.  If you can't do it right, the truth of which has been demonstrated adequately, then leave it the hell alone.  Mint hard money and let banks take care of banknotes, privately.

The trouble with government activity in the economy is that it re-assigns risks in unrealistic ways.  Naturally, government activity will affect the economy, as when the navy ships are in port, money flows.  It's when the government tries to do stuff in order to deal with the economy, directly, that is the problem.  So.  Quit it. 

Maybe we can curb some of the bureaucratic temptation to help us, by helping themselves to the public purse.

And I'm getting pretty damned suspicious about government fooling around with education, too.

A billion here, and a billion there . . .

When you save, you park some unneeded money somewhere -- bank, bond, stock, mattress -- in hopes that when you want to turn that money into something needed, like food or rent, it will be there. If you put the money into a bank you are thought to be prudent. If you put the money into the stock market you are thought to be a genius when the market rises, and an unfortunate victim when the market falls, as it inevitably but unpredictably does.

 

 When you put your money into any financial institution, bank or corporation, wonder of wonders, they don't actually keep it for you. The institution either spends it frivolously or loans it to some moron who can dress well enough to impress a lending officer. The institution frequently makes some money in spite of itself and sometimes distributes some of the money to you -- always first assuring that its officers get bonuses at year end. You, of course, would frequently not approve of how your money gets spent. And you are betting that both the money and the institution you put it into will be there when you need it to be, despite observing one institution after another bite the big one over your lifetime. It requires a great deal of blind, unreasoning faith to make this bet, and this faith used to be called patriotism.

 

 Nowadays, we have a new economic system. It seems a mere handful of exploited foreigners can manufacture all the products that are actually needed, and a great deal more besides. So we've turned ourselves into developers and marketers of unneeded goods and services -- just kinda to keep our hand in. Many of us basically get paid for peddling something unnecessary, but if it doesn't sell, we don't eat, so we keep at it anyway. Many more of us, not wishing to peddle garbage, have become what is called -- with a straight face, mind you -- knowledge workers. We collect data and reassemble bits and pieces of it into new and exciting configurations so as to support the making of predominately inconsequential decisions, which in turn mostly have to do with how to sell more shoddy goods and unneeded services. Finally, if we are good at peddling garbage or mining data, we get to supervise others in the same sad trades, whether or not we are good at supervising.

 

But each and every worthless trinket that gets bought and pitched into a landfill ( a whole 'nother issue ) contributes even if only slightly to keeping some poor desperate drone alive and secure in the knowledge that somehow he matters.

 

That drone may be you or it may be me, so spend while you can and don't be stingy. It all counts. 

 

 Of course, when times get tough, lots of us lose our worthless jobs, so we can't spend.  Generally, the cause of such tough times is usually, but not always, caused by government policies.  This is known as bad luck, or karma.  In such times, government steps in and gives money to those who've are no longer getting paid for doing the stupid stuff they used to get paid for.  The theory is that those people will thereby be able to continue to spend and will, in due course, continue to support this financial merry go round.  But since we don't actually have a government that is quite right bright, those exalted government managers are unable to understand that every dollar they give to somebody to stimulate spending, comes from taxing somebody who now no longer has that dollar to spend because government took it.  So, in fact, the effect of "stimulating" the economy which depends on spending, is really merely shifting the same spending from one sector to another, with no real actual gain. 

 

 So hang on as long as you can, because our government leaders think that energetically whirling around in circles somehow is evidence of their being a big wheel.  And the fact that the system is spinning around in one spot makes it dig itself in deeper and deeper.  In other words, we are so screwed.

 

Hating Hillary . . .

Hillary Clinton's defiant congressional testimony before Congress concerning the management of the Benghazi travesty has brought some old critics out of the closet.  Take a look, here.  Wow.

That is, wow, if it is true.  But also, wow, if it's false.  Somebody, either Hillary or her accuser, here, is a sure-enough, bigtime weasel.

Apropos of nothing much, I always wondered how it was that the mysteriously missing billing records from her time as an influential attorney working for the Rose Law Firm, while married to the state governor, were found much later, when no longer useful, in the plate room of the White House.  (But I never lost any sleep over it.)

Common sense gun restrictions . . .

The Wall Street Journal, among others, reports that al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb has kidnapped about forty people, including Americans.  The Islamists are doing this in Algeria, in order to retaliate against the French, who are intervening in Mali.  The location of the kidnappers and the kidnappees is far away from any immediately effective response.  An Algerian security force attempted to storm the place to rescue the hostages, but was driven off.

See?  This just goes to show that all the wrong kind of people have access to guns.  It should therefore be a national priority to eliminate easy access to guns that can be used to shoot people.  The Supreme Court said that we have a constitutional right to own guns, but there can be reasonable restrictions on gun ownership.  So, the common sense solution to the problem is to let people only have the kind of guns that are incapable of shooting people.

We would all be much safer then, because terrorists would be unable to use deadly force, since they would naturally only own the kind of guns that are incapable of shooting people.  Terrorists would have to content themselves with yelling.  Which, you have to admit, would be better for us infidels.

Of course, psychopaths, like the ones who shot up the schools, or the one who shot up a theater, or the one who shot up an army post, or the one who shot up the University of Virginia, all would still be able figure out ways to obtain the old fashioned kind of guns that can shoot people.  But we are just going to have to live with that because, as I'm sure you all know, being a dangerous psychopath is a civil right, such that attempting to restrict a psychopath from being dangerous would seriously trample on their free expression of their psychopathology.

You win some, you lose some.

I Know It's Crazy But What Would Happen if . . .

I've been reading about the incredible debt the U.S. has been undertaking here of late.  Things like, the debt in the last three years has increased by 60%.  Things like, the amount of debt growth in the last four years is greater than all the debt the government ever undertook -- and paid off -- since the country was formed. 

Young people are so screwed by this debt.  Their entire productive future is at risk of having politicians pay federal debt out of their future.  They have to pay off unconscionable student loans, and pay off the government's traitorous level of overspending, and have a life, too?

I've also been reading about the gun regulation controversy, and some have gone so far as to suggest that armed rebellion or even a break-up of the states, forming several smaller countries, could result from an attempt to take guns away.  Probably not, but what if . . .

So, what happens if a few states decide to up and quit?  Would there be a civil war, again?  Nowadays, would Pennsylvania, for example, supply it's young men to fight in a war to prevent Texas, for example, from withdrawing?  Would they go?  At this point in our country's story, do we have enough currently serving military officers willing to go to war on the president's orders to prevent disintegration?  Or would they resign their commissions?  More importantly, are there enough riflemen willing to obey orders to shoot at Americans at home, and get shot at by them, in turn?

Maybe not.  The American military is best equipped to fight "big" wars with massive force.  Would the military leaders really order missles to be fired and bombs to be dropped on fellow Americans, in this day and age? 

And here's my question.  If some states were to withdraw and form a new government for themselves, leaving the union, would  their citizens cease to be U.S. citizens?  And if so, what's their responsibility for the national debt?

If the national debt gets worse, would or could a price be reached by a money hungry federal government to let citizens of a state "buy its way out" of the union, with a negotiated payment price and terms? 

Win-win?

A new year's fiscal cliffery . . .

It's now 2013, a new year, and righteous time for resolutions.  The Republicans have resolved to continue being Republicans, and the Democrats have resolved to continue being Democrats, the proof of which proposition exists in the cliff avoidance plan adopted in the Senate, at the absolute last minute, when they've had literally years to figure out how to get this done.  Gah!

What was the fiscal cliff?  It was a silly scheme whereby if our political masters couldn't finally figure out how to reform our tax system and/or how to bring overspending under control, then the previous tax cuts would "automatically" expire having the effect of increasing the tax burden, and massive spending cuts would "automatically" happen, "across the board."  The morons who passed this legislative kludge thought of it as so repulsive that surely they would have to figure out a good way of growing up to accomplish good government, so as to avoid going over the cliff that they had created for themselves.

Okay, we have two massive problems.  The first problem is that we're broke.  The government doesn't have enough money to do all the things it has committed itself to do.  What should be done? 

One thing would be to reduce spending, first, by eliminating all waste, and second, by eliminating all unauthorized spending, and third, by reneging on selected committments for impossibility.  (Wait one.  Unauthorized spending?  There hasn't been a budget passed for three years; it's all unauthorized!  And renege on what kind of committments?  For example, do we have to give money to the Palestinians and the Egyptians, when we already give money to the United Nations, thereby funding international corruption?) 

Another thing to do about being broke, which has been the strategy of choice, more or less, for the last ninety years or so, is just print up additional new money.  That's called inflation and our government masters have decided a long time ago that a "little bit" of inflation is a good thing, somehow.  This is absolutely going to continue happening.  Oh, and "more than a little bit" is defined as when people start to pay attention.

I teach bankruptcy.  One of the interesting features about bankruptcy is that debtors are nearly always able to keep increasing their debt during "pre-bankruptcy," which means that there's always somebody who expects to profit from somebody else's financial vulnerability by lending, despite the signs of financial insecurity. 

That leads to the third response to being broke.  Borrow money to keep living beyond one's means.  It's kind of like, how can I be broke?  People keep lending me money.  How can I be broke?  There's still blank checks in my checkbook.

And this is why Congress invented the fiscal cliff for itself.  Basically, Congress said that if we hadn't done anything effective to control our spending and revenue, then, magically on January 1, 2013, we would be officially broke in our own estimation, even if there were people who were willing for one reason or another, to keep lending and funding our financial descent into harmless world-class international inconsequentiality.  (Why, there might be world leaders who would welcome and encourage the collapse of the United States.  Imagine that!)

So, what did the Senate do at the last effing gasp of December 31, 2012?  It passed a law to twiddle with taxes and do nothing about spending, so as to claim that it saved us from the cliff.  Basically, spending will be looked at in the future when we examined the so-called debt limit that we (wink, wink, nudge, nudge) impose on ourselves. 

See, we aren't broke at all.  We can keep the party going by a quick trip to the ATM.  We can always borrow more; it's just money and other people's money at that.

And that leads us to our second massive problem.  That is, that all of our political masters, legislative, judicial, and executive, are more or less but always too much, either stupid or evil.  No other explanation will account.

I think our political class thinks that it can continue along the same path it set out on since President Wilson, because the American public at large is extremely reluctant and unlikely to pick up its guns and engage in an armed revolution against the present parasitical and tyrannical government.  (But maybe all the guns better be seized, I mean controlled, for just in case.)

And I agree.  It won't come to that, and that's why I don't own a gun.

But massive civil disobedience?  That sounds more likely. 

When you think about it, perhaps government has lost, or is about to lose the benefit of the public conviction that government can essentially be trusted to act for the greater good.  If government ceases to be an advocate for justice, and becomes a mere change agent to redistribute wealth, then it loses it's moral justification for the use of overwhelming force even as it may continue to use overwhelming force.  At that point, government becomes our adversary, which like any adversary might be outwitted, deceived, and finally beaten in that fashion.

And for this reason, I can say without a trace of cynicism, I wish us all a Happy New Year, and I resolve to continue to have faith in the foundational ideals that formed our unique American culture.

The NRA misses the target . . .

Okay, so I expected silliness from the anti-gun side.  They want more regulation in spite of the simple fact that all of the proposed regulations, as well as the considerable regulations that already exist, won't prevent a nut case who hates his mother enough to put four rounds into her face from blowing away little kids, if that's the plan.  Nevertheless we have calls to ban automatic weapons, which have already been illegal since the 1930's, or to ban high capacity magazines, when all a crazy nut nonentity loser has to do is buy several regular magazines and stick them into his pocket on his way to the elementary school, or the theater, or the church, and on his way to momentary fame with his name and picture spread all over the news for a week or two.

And I also expected that the National Rifle Association would reject the notion that it is somehow complicit in mass murders.

But the recent press conference by the NRA is just as silly as the anti-gun dreamers.  The motto is now, "Guns don't kill people.  Violent video games and Hollywood slasher movies kill people." Give me a break.  Those things are classless and repulsive, but that's about it.  If anything, violent or pornographic movies and media might act as an outlet for twisted aggression rather than as an instigator of evil.

So what does the head of the NRA suggest?  Armed guards in all schools.  Right. 

The government and the Cult of Homeland Security has done such a good job with the TSA and airport safety; let's create a government school security authority, armed, for safety sake.

Hey, it isn't that I don't care that our little kids, or big kids for that matter, are highly vulnerable.  It's just that I don't trust government solutions to do anything, other than increase opportunities for graft and political patronage, to protect the kids. 

But hey.

It occurs to me that there are lots of citizens at home, nowadays, having lost their jobs.  and a whole lot of those jobs are never coming back.  So what do we have?  An untapped pool of home school instructors, that's what.  If schools are so dangerous that we have to have armed guards permanently posted in the schools, well, keep the kids home, where they will be safer.  And probably better educated in the long run.

What serious people do . . .

 



An elementary school in Israel.  Prepared to improve the odds.  (Thanks)

Have you ever noticed that all the crazies who want to go out in a blaze of bullets before the final round that ends their life, never, ever, choose to go to a police station and try to shoot all the cops?

Realistic response to a threat = teacher has a carbine.  Idealistic response to a threat = lock the doors and call "first responders".  Silly response to a threat = gun free zones.

John Kerry for Secretary of State . . .

The leading edge in men's fashion . . . .

Tights for men?  They are are calling them "meggings," for men's leggings, I guess. 

With all the cultural conditioning that goes on from birth about the proper distinctions between men and women, well, let's just say there's a name that's suitable for men who choose to wear meggings.

Give it a moment.  It'll come to you.

How civilization ends, not with a bang, but a guffaw

Evidently, adult "onesies" are what all the seriously hip people in the UK are wearing.

Open the gates and let the barbarians in; this civilization's done for.

The Imperial City Council has decreed . . .

The Portland City Council went all in, declaring that no retailers can offer plastic bags, and all must offer paper bags.  The mayor says that this is because the plastic bags get into the ocean, citing no evidence of any kind. 

I don't know anybody who disposes of plastic grocery bags in a way that's gets the bags into the ocean -- unless the trash collection companies are sneaking trash containing plastic grocery bags into the ocean, and if that's the case it seems to me that the point of the solution is to deal with them.  Not that I think that's what's happening.

I just wonder how it is that the grocery bags get to the ocean, as the mayor has noted.  For that matter, I wonder what color the sky is in the mayor's world, and can he hear it when the butterflies blink.

Anyhow, paperbags are only somewhat recyclable and much of them end up turning into a nasty substance in permanent landfills.  When they get recycled, you get paper stuff.  Plastic bags are also recyclable, and require less energy to do so, and there's lots of high-value products made from the plastic.  For that matter, the plastic bags could be, themselves, a product of recycling.

Anyhow, I, for one, think plastic grocery bags are superior to paper grocery bags, and I think that the Imperial City Council of Portland is populated by morons whose egos have sucked their brains dry.

But you know what? 

I'd be perfectly okay with a ban on plastic bags in favor of paper bags, if the matter could be put to a vote, and the majority of us citizens voted in favor of a ban on plastic grocery bags. 

In other words, the issue isn't just the relative merits of paper or plastic.  The other, greater, issue, is who is the boss of you.  And I've got a good idea how the city council thinks about that.

Always listen to the man with a badge and a taser, boys and girls, for he is your friend and will save and protect you . . .

A clear case of contempt of cop.

Pinellas Park, Florida -- Daniel Jensen wasn't running from the law, he was trying to protect his home from burning up. Yet, Pinellas Park Police tasered him in the process. Jensen and his attorney say it's an excessive use of force.
Jensen was still shaken and visibly emotional as he retold what happened last Thursday evening. He said being tasered by police has not only impacted him, but it also impacted his children, who saw it all happen.
He described the Pinellas Park Police officers actions as "brutal." He said they showed "no compassion."
"All I remember is laying in water, being electrocuted for saving my home," said Jensen.
Four days later, burns on Daniel Jensen's body still mark where the stun gun's probes hit him. He says they tasered him for doing what any father and husband would do protect his family's home from an out-of-control grease fire.
The 42-year-old father of two recalls his wife waking him around 6 in the evening, saying there's a big fire at his neighbor's house.
"I could hear it, I could feel it," he explained.
He ran outside and grabbed a fire extinguisher. He sprayed it until it was empty.
"I was calling for my daughter and getting no response. I came out, grabbed the hose and sprayed her room until I heard she was out. I was always taught to help when you can; help is what I tried to do," said Jensen.
He continued to recount the events. He said he then took the garden hose and started watering down his fence and the back corner of his rooftop, trying to prevent the fire from spreading to his property. But with each attempt, Daniel said Pinellas Park Police kept pulling him back... even though firefighters were not in sight.
"They kept telling me, 'Let it go, that's what insurance is for.' That's not acceptable to me," said Jensen.
Captain Sanfield Forseth with the Pinellas Park Police Department said officers could have charged him with obstruction for not listening to an officer's orders.
"I wasn't doing that. What I was doing was what any home owner would do to protect a family and home," said Jensen.
Captain Forseth said the department will not be charging him.
When Jensen saw the fire jump on to his back roof, he again grabbed the hose. That's when he said -- unknown to him -- a police officer pulled out a taser and fired it at his back.
"As I went to grab the hose, I hear an officer on this side. There was a boat here; he was just behind it. He said, 'Hit him, hit him! Take him down, tase him!'" explained Jensen. "I didn't know they were talking to me, or about me. I was concerned about putting water on the fire, and the next thing you know I'm being tased."
Daniel said a Sergeant ordered an officer to tase him, but the officer never warned him as department policy requires.
According to Pinellas Park Police policy, an officer will use a taser when "other control techniques" would likely result in a "physical confrontation" that may cause injury to the officer or person. But the officer must first give a "verbal warning" that he is going to use a taser.
After tasing Daniel, he said several officers picked him up, carried him to the front yard, threw him on the ground and handcuffed him.
Daniel says he's very disappointed in the police department.
"They should have more tolerance with the public, to exhaust all options before firing electricity into somebody, handcuff them instead of tasering them."
Daniel said about the experience as he fights through tears, "It was horrible. I was laying in a puddle of water being electrocuted here by the people that are supposed to protect us. I'm trying to protect my family, my neighbor, and they bring harm to me. I don't understand."

Captain Forseth with the Pinellas Park Police Department said they exhausted all other options, and that their goal was to keep Daniel and the officers safe from the fire.

 

 The cops are supposed to  be law enforcement.  To you and me, and most cops, that means, they have special powers of arrest in aid of enforcing criminal laws and they have a duty to do so.  But some cops . . .

Here, cops ordered this guy to stop doing what any normal person would do in such an emergency -- he wasn't committing any crime.  No crime, no special cop powers.  But he ignored their orders.  So he had to be tased.  For his own safety.  And this was probably an "obstruction of justice" according to the chief cop, because he wouldn't stop doing what he had a legal right to do, at the command of a cop, based on the cop's uninformed and untrained opinion -- backed up by a badge and a taser.

What about the election . . .

I'm supposed to comment on the election?  Okay.

It's about hand.  The issue is, are you willing to dump devotion, reverence, reliability, and competence in order to get the upper hand? 

You know the answer.  The entire steady march of 19th century Marxism through the 20th century is all the proof you need.

It's a mystery . . .

Since the first 9/11 Al Qaeda has been reported to have been in recession, as its various participants periodically blew themselves up, or got shot, or were vaporized by a drone. 

The economy of the U.S. has likewise been receding. 

Now, with the second 9/11, it seems that Al Qaeda has revived itself a lot more successfully than our economy.

And I say . . . hmm.

The regime abides . . .

The regime abides.

When Charles Woods, the father of Tyrone Woods, one of the Navy SEALS who died fighting in Benghazi, met with Hillary Clinton, the Secretary of State assured him that, “We’re going to have that person arrested and prosecuted that did the video.” And they got him, officially on charges of violating parole, unofficially on charges of violently offending violent Muslims.

The woman whose policy had overthrown the Libyan government and then placed a barely defended consulate in the middle of a city of Jihadists, did not promise the grieving father that his son's killers would pay. She promised him that the man who offended his son's killers would pay. Not only would his son be the first casualty of that appeasement policy, but the Constitution that his son had sworn to support and defend would be the second casualty.

Read the whole thing. 

I remember being very, very troubled by Watergate.  This is worse.