The 2004 Presidential Election-
What Does It Mean for the Future?
C. Paul Smith
As projected~ the 2004 Presidential Election was very close. When I retired at 2:00 a.m. Wednesday morning, the reelection of President George W. Bush looked certain. The next day, at 11:00 am., Senator Kerry conceded defeat, acknowledging that a count of the 145,000 provisional ballots in Ohio would not give him enough votes to overcome his 130,000-vote deficit.
President George W. Bush won the electoral vote 286 - 252 (as compared with 271-267 in 2000). But this time President Bush also received a majority of the popular vote (by 3 1/2 million votes). While the victory was narrow, it nevertheless gives President Bush some vindication and a majority popular approval of his policies on the war on terror, Iraq, tax cuts, the economy, and support of traditional marriage.
There are, however, some less obvious, but extremely important observations to be made about the 2004 Election: they relate to the following matters, which will be discussed briefly below:
I. MajorMediaBias
II. Reliability of Most Polls
III.Unreliability of Exit Polls
IV.Release of the Osama bin Laden Video on Election Eve
V.Effect of Conservative Media
VI.Effect of Bipartisan Campaign Finance Reform Act
VII.Effect of Presidential Debates
VIII.Effect of Third-Party Candidates
IX.Myth that High Voter Turnout Is Better for Democrats
X.Why Did Kerry Fail to Win?
XI.The Great Divide--A Polarized Nation
XII.The Next Political Battle--the Nomination and Confirmation of Justices to the Supreme Court
XIII.Education--the Key to the Future
1. Major Media Bias
Like many Americans, as we watched the election returns Tuesday evening, we switched from network to network to compare how and when they were announcing their projections. The most obvious difference was the protracted delays on the part of ABC, CNN and CBS m announcing their projections as to the winner in Ohio. Whereas FOX News and NBC both announced, shortly after midnight their projections that Bush had won in Ohio, ABC, CNN and CBS all refused to admit the obvious--that Kerry could not win--until mid-day on Wednesday. By 2:00 a.m. on Wednesday morning, it was abundantly clear that Kerry could not win Ohio, and therefore that Bush would win the presidency. With this in mind, I went to bed and rested assured. But the next morning, when I checked the different networks, ABC, CNN and CBS continued to insist that Ohio was too close to call. But their reasoning in support was pathetic--it demonstrated that they were desperately, emotionally, clinging to the hope that somehow Kerry would pull it out and win in Ohio. But there was no basis for the hope. This failure to call Ohio for Bush, just highlighted the bias of ABC, CNN and CBS for Kerry.
Despite the multiple revelations of the pro-Kerry/pro Democrat bias in October, CBS and Dan Rather continue to operate m a manner oblivious to their prejudice that all can plainly see. In case you forgot, the timing of the 60-Minutes broadcast casting aspersions on President Bush's National Guard Service of 30 years ago, was intended to hurt Bush in the polls, and was based upon a forged document. When the forgery was made manifest, CBS insisted that its report was valid, even though it was based upon the forged document. And then, just a week prior to the November 2nd Election, CBS was planning to run another 60- 3.1 Minutes program (on Sunday evening, October 31st) that would accuse the Bush administration of (18 months earlier) allowing a cache of380 tons of explosives in Al Qaqaa, Iraq to slip out of its possession during the war in Iraq. But the CBS attempt to ambush the Bush campaign backfired when The New York Times, normally a CBS ally, ran the story a week before CBS wanted the accusation aired. This gave the Bush administration enough time to refute the accusation before Election Day--and they did; they presented evidence showing that the explosives were gone before we got there. By the time the dust settled on this story, CBS had once again proved its anti-Bush bias--a bias so strong that CBS had again rushed to judgment against Bush without supporting evidence. The polls showed that the allegations of neglect initially caused Kerry to pick up a few points and to pull ahead of Bush in the polls. But by Election Day, after the Bush people had exposed the allegations, Bush regained his slight lead in the polls.
Conservatives are infuriated at Dan Rather and CBS. The perfect punishment for them would be to allow them to continue to broadcast their biased material, as a living monument to not only the bias of CBS and Dan Rather, but also to their patent desires to put the advancement of their own political agendas ahead of objective news coverage.
But let's not forget the ABC anti-Bush bias, either. On the eve of the second 'The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) reported that Saddam Hussein had 380 tons of explosives at Al Qaqaa. The IAEA reported that it had marked these explosives for identification. However, by the time American troops arrived at Al Qaqaa, these explosives were akeady gone. On April 10, 2003, the 101' Airborne found no IAEA-marked explosives when they arrived in Al Qaqaa. And a few days prior to this, when the Third Infantry Division arrived in Al Qaqaa, they had also searched and found no lALA-marked explosives. See The Washington Post, October 28, 2004 and The Washington Times, October 26 and 28, 2004. CLU presidential debate, ABC News Political Director Mark Halpern issued a memo to his news people, including Charles Gibson, who would moderate that debate, with a clear, implicit message to be tougher on Bush than on Kerry. The memo said this: '[T]he current Bush attacks on Kerry involve distortions and taking things out of context in a way that goes beyond what Kerry has done~" Therefore, Mr. Halpern wrote that ABC News has "a responsibility to hold bo(h sides accountable to the public interest, but that doesn't mean we reflexively and artificially hold both sides 'equally' accountable when the facts don't warrant that... It's up to Kerry to defend himself, of course But as one of the few news organizations with the skill and strength to help voters evaluate what the candidates are saying to serve the public interest [sic]. Now is the time for all of us to step up and do that right." "ABC's memo problem," The Washington Times, October 12, 2004.
Neither let us forget Michael Moore's propaganda film, Fahrenheit 911, that masqueraded as a documentary film. Senator Kerry received a significant boost in election support from this film that portrayed President Bush as an inept, blundering figure. Many viewers accepted and continue to accept this rendition as factual. In fact, there is talk that it may be nominated for an academy award for the best documentary of the year. If this happens, it will be further proof of how deeply infected Hollywood is with its anti-Bush/anti-conservative bias.
And all of this background, of course, just sets the stage for the Election night coverage Thus, after we watched FOX News and NBC News project Ohio for Bush, we had to laugh when we saw Dan Rather, Wolf Biitzer and Judy Woodruff sweating bullets and frantically insisting that Ohio was too close to call. The irony of their bias is that they don't seem to see it--they do~ seem to recoghize their proDemocrat/pro-Kerry/anti-Bush bias.
II. Reliability of Most Polls
Except for the exit polls, and for the polls that were taken and published on Halloween weekend, just prior to Election Day, the American pollsters appeared to have produced fairly reliable results, except for the Halloween weekend polls. (The exit poll problems are discussed below.) There were two principle reasons that the Halloween weekend polls were slanted in favor of Kerry.
First of all,expert pollsters tell us that weekend polls are not reliable because their weekend participants tend to be skewed--usually in favor of Democrats. In spite of this, the pollsters took and reported polls to attempt to gauge the positions of Bush and Kerry as Election Day approached. These polls showed a slight lead for Kerry. Of course, the pollsters did not announce the inlierent "weekend weakness" of these polls. But, conservative talk shows did provide this limitation, to those who tuned in to hear it.
But this year, there was also a second flaw in these polls--the major pollsters gave 2-3 points to Kerry in their fmal polls because they said that the undecided voters tend to vote against the incumbent and because there were many fffst-time voters who (although unreachable in their polling data) should be projected as voting for the challenger. As it turns out, the evidence does not bear dut either of these presumptions.
The bottom line is that most of the polls from the Sunday and Monday preceding Election Day showed Kerry with a slight lead. But, from the Election Day results on Tuesday, it was President Bush who had the slight lead.
III. Unreliability of the Exit Polls
Closely related to, if not actually another part of, the rnajor media bias against President Bush and Republicans is what happened with the exit polling on Election Day 2004.
Random, written questions were submitted to voters Tuesday after they cast their votes. (Actually, there is some question as to how "random" these were.) But, in any event these questionnaires sought to elicit the thinking of voters as to why they voted the way they did. This year, I happened to have been asked to c9mplete such a questionnaire--so I did
Later that evening, in watching the news coverage of returns, I listened to several commentators talking about and analyzing the results of this exit polling data. Wow! What a startling experience! I was astounded at the conclusions the commentators were trying to make from these questionnaires. To give one example of how flawed these questionnaires were, consider the following: One question was for me to select from a group of a dozen possible issues, what to me were the two, most important issues in the 2004 presidential election. The list included all the main issues--health care, gun control, the economy, tax Cuts, etc. I selected "terrorism" and "moral values." However, another possibility was "Iraq." Now, in my thinking, Iraq is intricately a part of the war on terrorism; I selected "terrorism" since it was broader and "included" the war in Iraq. Later, I heard a commentator reporting on findings from the exit polls that showed that those voters who saw Iraq as the main issue in this election, tended to vote for Kerry by a 4-to- 1 margin, whereas voters who saw terrorism as the main issue in this election tended to vote for Bush by a similarly large margin. I was appalled that the commentators sought to extrapolate voter intent from questions in a way that I found to be misleading. The poll-takers sought to oversimplify voter intent. The question upon which their analysis was based was unsuitable to support the conclusions for which the questions were used.
But, of course, the major problem with the exit polls this year, was that they were cited to show that Kerry was winning big--bigger in virtually every state where they were used. They showed Kerry winning by 18 points in Pennsylvania (Kerry eventually won in Pennsylvania, but by a much narrower margin.) They showed Kerry winning in North Carolina, Florida and Ohio, and they showed him competing in Virginia--to name a few states. As ~he results of these exit polls were made available around noon on Tuesday, the Kerry camp was feeling quite good about things--in fact, it looked like he could win in a landslide
However, before midnight on Tuesday, all analysts, and all of the nation who were tuned in to the news, realized that the exit polling data was unreliable; those charged with determining whether and when to project a state for Bush or Kerry had to disregard the exit polling data.
So bad was this exit polling data, that there has arisen universal curiosity to find out why it was so bad. In 2008 the effect of this colossal botch-up is that no one will rely on exit polling data in a close election. It will take a yet-to-be demonstrated track record of accurate exit polling, before those polls will again have legitimacy in the eyes of America.
IV. Release of the Osama bin Laden Video on Election Eve
One week before Election Day, a purported videotape of and from Osama bin Laden surfaced, in which Osama checked in A' on the Presidential Election. Analysts concluded that it was indeed Osama, and that it had been recently made.
Osama's 18-minute video echoed the Democrat Party's talking points in criticizing President Bush For example, Osama blamed George Bush for causing problems, and he pledged to bankrupt America in its efforts to fight terrorism. For example, he even criticized President Bush for reading to elementary school kids for a few minutes after learning of the jet crashing into one of the World Trade Center towers on September 11, 2001. 1 mention this criticism because it is such an insignificant matter. I am not suggesting any collusion between Osama and the Democrats; but the video does show that the terrorists listened to the criticisms made by Senator Kerry and others against America and the President. In the heat of the election campaign, Mr. Kerry and his supporters, did say things that encouraged the terrorists. The Osama video proves this.
In response to the Osama video, both President Bush and Senator Kerry denounced bin Laden and promised to defeat the terrorists.
The effect of the video on the Election did not appear to be major. But in a close election, sometimes small things can tip the scales in one direction or another. Democrats discounted any effect that the video might have for either party. But it may have given the President a slight lift. While the video was a reminder that Bush has failed to capture bin Laden, it nevertheless was a reminder of the continuing threat that the terrorists pose to America. And since Osama aimed his criticisms at Bush, and not Kerry, the American reaction may have been to increase support for Bush.
It appears that the Osama video was timed to be an in-your-face, defiant statement to mock America for being unable to capture Osama or to stop terrorism. It seems to be a reflection of Osama's inflated feeling of importance, rather than an attempt to affect the outcome of the election. If Osama did intend to help Senator Kerry with his video, he failed. Perhaps in his training he never learned the story of Br'er Rabbit and the briar patch.
V. Effect of Conservative Media
There is no question that George W. Bush would not have won the 2004 election without the conservative talk shows, especially Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity, and without the "fair and balanced"2 news reporting of FOX News. These organizations and program's aired the Bush side of issues that were not covered by the mainstream media. Those who have not read and listened to the news from both sources will likely be unable to acknowledge this bias.
Almost every day I compare the treatment of issues in The Washington Post to the treatment in The Washington Times. Regularly, the treatment is different. And the liberal, mainstream media, just doesn't get it. For example, I recently read a letter in The Washington Post where its chief editorial writer defended the newspaper by stating that The Post's opinion pages operated independently from the news pages of the paper, such that while the editorial page might support John Kerry, this did not affect how the news pages treated Kerry and Bush. Once again, I had to laugh--they just don't get it! In fact that the opinion pages are run independent of the news pages does not mean that the two are not both biased. In fact, it is the news pages that are more infected with bias than the editorial pages. At least when you read an editorial, you know that it is in the '~opinion" section. By definition, the two pages of opinion pieces are all acknowledged to be such. But the biases in The Washington Post that I find most offensive are (i) the selection of stories, (ii) the omission of stories, (iii) the location of stories (whether on the front page or inside pages), and (iv) the headlines and article captions.
VI. Effect of the Bipartisan Campaign Finance Reform Act
The 2004 Presidential Election has made a farce of the Bipartisan Campaign Finance Reform Act (BCFRA). It did not keep money out of the campaigns. The Section 527 loophole was so big that it made a joke of the BCFRA expenditure restrictions.
Both parties and their supporters learned how to get around the BCFRA limits, and we ended up with a campaign that attracted more spending than ever before.
VII. Effect of Presidential Debates
As a Bush supporter, I was frustrated at some of the President's performance in the debates with Senator Kerry: Specifically, his failure to respond to accusations that (a) he fifed General Shinseki because he requested that too many troops be sent to Iraq; (b) that the war in Iraq was a "diversion" from the war on terrorism, and that this caused the U.S. to take away troops that were needed in Afghanistan and to send them to Iraq; and (c) that the President botched an opportunity to capture Osama bin Laden in Tora Bora I was frustrated at the President's failure to promptly respond and refute these allegations. Nevertheless, I believe the President was right and Kerry was in error on most of the substantive issues in the debates.
President Bush's re-election has now proven that a candidate (at least the incumbent president) can lose the debates and still win the election. This is reassuring because it proves that many of the people can see through the limitations of debates as being the best indicator for which candidate would be best for the nation.
By saying this, I do not mean to disparage President Bush. I believe he did fine, especially in the latter two debates. But Senator Kerry clearly won the first debate. And Senator Kerry proved that he is not only a capable, but a very eloquent speaker. Frankly, Senator Kerry was very impressive in the debates--and a better debater than President Bush. But I found Kerry wanting--and in many instances wrong on the substance of his words. The Presidential debates of 2004 shows that the nation is capable of using the debates as one factor, but not necessarily the deciding factor in assessing who should be the President.
VIII. Effect of Third-Party Candidates
The 2004 Presidential Election marked the first election since 1988 where a third-party candidate did not have a major impact on the results. The Nader vote did not prevent Senator Kerry from carrying any state. However, in 2000, it is quite obvious that if Nader had not been on the ballot in Florida, then Al Gore would most probably have picked up the extra 538 votes he needed to win Florida and the election. Similarly, in both 1992 and 1996, third-party candidate Ross Perot took votes from Republican candidates Bush (1992) and Dole (1996) to give those election victories to Bill Clinton.
To this day, President Bill Clinton is regarded by his party as having extraordinary charisma and magic as a politician It is easy to overlook the Perot factor. And remember, Clinton never did win a majority of the popular vote in those elections.
IX. Myth that High Voter Turnout Is Better for Democratic Candidates
Going into Election Day, Senator Kerry's camp believed that a large voter turnout would take him to victory. He and the pollsters and the main stream media all believed that high voter turn out would work to Kerry's favor. However, that is not what happened. Oh, the turnout was very high--approximately 60%--an increase from the 2000 turnout of 56%. But the additional votes were going for Bush more than for Kerry. The Republican Party never did buy into the traditional thinking that a high turn out favored Democrats. The Republicans beat the bushes and energized its base, bringing in a record turnout that made Bush victorious.
X. Why Did Kerry Fail to Win?
This is the question that the Democrats are asking themselves in analyzing the election results. But to me, it was an incredible feat for him to even make it close. In order for him to get his party's nomination, he had to abandon his recently acquired pro-war stance and adopt the stance of the left wing of the Democratic Party to oppose and criticize the war. Howard Dean was activating the Democratic base by vehemently denouncing Bush and the Iraq war; in order for Kerry to win his party's nomination, he had to revert back to his antiwar stance and get out in front of that movement. This lie did; he out-maneuvered Dean and dethroned Dean as the party spokesman against the war, proclaiming that this was "the wrong war, at the wrong place, at the wrong time." Of all the candidates for the Democratic nontination, only Senator Joe Lieberman had the courage to defy the radical lefi wing of his party, as he continued to insist that the war in Iraq was right. After capturing the nomination, Senator Kerry had to change his stance to the Lieberman position in order to be competitive in the race for the White House. The Bush campaign rightly criticized Kerry with flip-flopping on this, the most critical issue ofthe election.
Thus, after winning the nomination as an anti-war candidate, Kerry had the almost impossible task of having to flip-flop to become pro-war and to make the case that President Bush's handling of the war was inept, was responsible for the loss of American troops, and was alienating the world. Kerry almost succeeded. The anti-Bush sentiment is so strong (close to one-half of the voters), that these people were happy to overlook not only Kerry's unprincipled political life, but also Kerry's over-the-top criticisms of America's efforts in lraq.3
When American troops claimed military control over Iraq in May of 2003, we had lost approximately 250 troops. This was an impressive victory, and the nation could stomach these losses. However, in the
In this regard, Kerry's 1971 testimony before the Senate Committee, in which he accused his fellow Americans of committing horiendous atrocities on the people in North Vietnam, turned a large segment of the nation against him. This black mark from his path, showed that Kerry was excessively aggressive ua pursuing his own political agenda at the expense of betraying his fellow soldiers. It was the outrageousness of his testimony that drew attention to him in 1971, and which perhaps helped him to achieve early political victories. But the facts caught up with him in 2004. And Kerry could not shake the disdain and anger of military veterans and others, who saw his a parallel between his anti-American statements in 1971 and his statements against the war in Iraq in 2004. 18 months since, we have lost approximately nine hundred troops to continual suicide bombings and attacks by terrorists/insurgents. These losses do not sit well with the nation; neither were these losses foreseen by the nation. Although President Bush was careful not to guarantee either a quick victory or a low casualty victory', many did not anticipate the extent of the terrorist attacks that have occurred since we dethroned Saddam Hussein. Nevertheless, both Bush and Kerry were united in asserting that America had to stick it out and prevail in Iraq. Kerry sought to distinguish himself by asserting that he would do better in directing the war--but he did not articulate a specific plan that differentiated himself from President Bush on this. And, frankly, President Bush had been steadfast atid resolute on Iraq--he has never flinched or wavered.
On Election Day, Americans reelected President Bush. Kerry came close; but he was not able to overtake Bush. In retrospect, it is amazing that Senator Kerry did as well as he did. In 2003, following the quick and decisive military victory in Iraq, President Bush's popularity was high, and no one gave much of a chances for any Democrat to succeed in November 2004. Senator Kerry's relative success was in large part due to his superb political skills.
XI. The Great Divid~-A Polarized Nation
One thing that the 2004 Election demonstrates is the great political divide that exists in America. It consists of a number of divisions superimposed over one another. There continues to be a sharp divide between whites and blacks. (Over 85% of 1~ the black vote went to Senator Kerry.) There is an urban-rural divide--virtually all rural areas voted for Bush, while virtually all urban areas voted for Kerry. The nation is also divided in its support for traditional marriage vs. gay unions. And the Democrats continue to attempt to divide America into the "Haves" and the "Have Nots."
Now that the Presidential Election is over, we may have a short period of good Will and unity. Historically, the nation often comes together innnediately following an election, despite the divisiveness and even viciousness of the campaign. And both President Bush and Senator Kerry have said the customary things about working together as a nation. But I don't think any reasonable spectator of American politics believes that any lenthy period of political unity will be maugurated by President Bush's victory and Senator Kerry's defeat Any period of peace is just the eye of the hurricane. Before long Congress and the nation will be embroiled in debating some important and divisive issues. I hope that the war on terror, including the war in Iraq, will not be one of these divisive issues. The nation must unite to defeat the forces of terrorism in Iraq and help the new Iraqi government to get off the ground.
But some of the divisive issues that will soon take center stage include the following:
- Federal Marriage Amendment
- Continuing the tax cuts
- Fixing Social Security
- National health care issues
- Partial-birth abortion
- Stem cell research
- Confirmation of federal judges, including nominees to the Supreme Court
President Bush characterized Senator Kerry as being "gracious" in his call conceding defeat and acknowledging the President's victory. But, as I listened to Senator Kerry's concession speech, I also heard his statements that the fight for their causes most go on and that "the President" should work to uni~ the country. Afready some of the liberal commentators are predicting that Bush won't be able to unite the nation, claiming that despite his promises to unite the nation in 2000 that he acted to alienate and divide the country. Well, the conservatives take issue with this accusation. Perhaps we can all agree that right now the nation is sharply divided on a number of issues. But if the recent Election means anything, it is the predominant consensus that it is the Democrats that are more divisive than the Republicans. And as evidence of the continuing efforts by liberals to divide and blame the nation, listen to the words of columnist E. J. Dionne, Jr. in The Washington Post on November 5~ 2004:
Let's be honest: We are aghast at the success of a campaign [the Bush campaign] based on vicious personal attacks, the exploitation of strong religious feelings and an effort to create the appearance of strong leadership that would do Hollywood proud. We are alarmed that so many of our fellow citizens could look the other way and not hold Bush accountable for the utter incompetence in Iraq and for untruths spoken in defense of the war. We are amazed that a majority was not concerned about heaping a huge debt burden on our children just to give large tax breaks to the rich.
And we are disgusted that an effort consciously designed to divide the country did exactly that--and won. With all his failures, Bush could not count on a whole lot more than 51 percent. Karl Rove and company calculated perfectly, organized painstakingly, greatly increased conservative turnout and produced a country divided just their way.
The opposition should not crawl into a hole or be silent about these things. A decent respect for the outcome of an election never requires free citizens to cower before a temporarily dominant majority There is, on the contrary, an obligation to stay engaged in a battle that, as John Edwards says, rages on.
... But the burden for achieving national unity is on a president who could manage a narrow victory only by savagely trashing his opponent
While I disagree with most of Mr. Dionne's conclusions3 I do believe that the tone of his opinion piece correctly describes the political posture that the Democrats will take in the coming months; it is not one of cooperation and conciliation.
XII. The Next Political Battle--the Nomination and Confirmation of Justices to the Supreme Court
Perhaps the most important issue for this country during the next four years will be the appointment of two to four new Justices to the Supreme Court. The Democrats live in fear that the President will select Justices who would overturn Roe V. Wade, 410 U.S. 113 (1973), in which the Court established a woman's right to have an abortion. This fear is what underlies the Democratic filibusters of President Bush's judicial nominees during the past two years.
And while Republicans will control 55 our of 100 seats in the Senate in 2004, this is 5 seats short of what is needed to block a filibuster. The editorial pages will be filled with opinion pieces about this ideological battle during the next couple of years. While President Bush was able to put off this fight during his first term, it cannot be avoided this term.
If Democrats continue to use the filibuster to prevent Senate votes on judicial nominees, then the Republican Senate will have to change their rules to eliminate the use of filibusters to block votes on judicial nominees.
There is already some building ~htensity on this issue, manifest by Senator Arlen Spector's warning that President Bush should not submit any nominee that would overturn Roe V. Wade. Senator Spector's comments may result in his fellow Republicans not votifig him to be chair of the Judiciary Committee. A. About "Strict Constructionists." Democrats fear all critics of Roe V. Wade and all "strict constructionist" judicial norninees. This phrase instantly evokes hysterical panic whenever liberals ever hear the phrase; and they fight for all they're worth to block any such nominees. But a word of education is in order regarding "strict constructionists." Few of them exist, and there is no reason President Bush would have to nominate one. First of all~ to be a "strict constructionist" means that one opposes the Court's recognizing any right except those specifically enumerated in the Constitution. Thus, a "strict constructionist" would not have voted to recognize the right to an abortion (Roe V. Wade), nor a couple's right to have access to contraceptives ((;riswold V. Connecticut and Eisenstadt V. Baird), nor the parents' right to rear their children (Troxel V. Granville).4 Of course, the problem with not being a "strict constructionist" is that there are no limits on what new rights the court can recognize or on what rights the court might refuse to recognize. For example, in the case of Roe v. Wade, the Court chose to recognize the woman's right to control her body, but the Court chose not to recognize the right of a fetus to continue to live, even though many states had recognized such a right. But on the other hand, the problem with true "strict constructionists" is that they reject the Ninth Amendment, which states: "The enumeration in the Constitution of certain rights shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people."
But having said all this about what a true "strict constructionist" is, the fact is that there is none on the Supreme Court--some Justices are merely "stricter" than others.
Leaving aside the technical meaning of "strict constructionism" the term is loosely used with different meanings by Republicans and Democrats. Republicans use it to mean one who is reluctant, cautious or stingy in identi~ing new constitutional rights. Arid in this sense, Republicans would identify Justices Scalia and Thomas as '1strict constructionists," even though neither is. On the other hand, Democrats use the term to mean someone who would overturn the sacred right to an abortion, established in Roe V. Wade; to Democrats the term is more of a label of horror than a term of any technical meaning.
But having now been educated on the true meaning of a "strict constructionist," let us move on to the present national pro blem of getting good judicial nominees for the Supreme Court and the appellate courts.
There is no reason why President Bush should nominate a true "strict constructionist" to he a Supreme Court Justice. What is needed is a non-activist judge who has the wisdom and courage to stand up against the growing tide in America ofjudges who legislate and abandon established interpretations of the Constitution. This abandonment has occurred with respect to the Establishment Clause (e.g., Ten Commandments monument cases), the meaning of which has been changed by the Supreme Court during the last 50 years. Similarly in the recent case of Lawrence V. Texas, 539 U.S. ___ (2003), a majority of the Court embraced judicial activism and discarded its traditional principles of stare decisis in order to embrace the new-found "liberty" under the Due Process Clauses to engage ifi private, consensual, adult homosexual conduct.
The nation does not need, and this writer does not want a "strict constructionist" Supreme Court Justice. We just need Justices who will uphold the Constitution and stop the activism and legislation and unwise creation of new rights.
B. About Roe v. Wade. Some words of instruction are also in order regarding Roe v. Wade. There were several problems with the Court's ruling in this case:
(1) The Court legislated,5 rather than merely ruled on a case; (2) The Court extended the power of the federal government to a new extreme by prohibiting states from protecting the fetal right to life, except in the last trimester of pregnancy; (3) The Court held that a fetus is not a "person" within the meaning of the Due Process Clauses of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments; and (4) The Court established a woman's right to privacy and to control her own body, and the Court held that this right included a limited right to have an abortion--a right that is virtually unlimited in the first two trimesters of a pregnancy.
In my opinion, one part of the Roe V. Wade ruling is good-4he identification and upholding of a woman's right to control her own body. But this right should not be an "absolute" that can always extinguish the right to life of the child with whom she is pregnant. The Supreme Court erred, in my opinion, by extinguishing the fetal right to life. The Court could have ruled that both rights should be recognized. Had they so ruled, the two would have to be balanced if the mother would want an abortion.
But one of the problems we face today is that Roe V. Wade has now been extended beyond what it was in 1973 At least one court today has invalidated the law recently passed by Congress banning partial-birth abortions. These radical judges have tried to eliminate the states' right (recognized in Roe) to prohibit abortions in the last trimester in order to protect potential human life.
The overturning of Roe v Wade, was desirable 30 years ago. Several fetal right to life amendments were proposed to do this. But none has succeeded At this point, however, it makes no sense to exert political 5 The Court established a pregnancy trimester scheme to determine when a woman would have a right to an abortion and when a state could have the power to prohibit an abortion because of its interest in potential human life effort to overturn Roe V. Wade. But we certainly need Supreme Court Justices who will stop the courts from further extending the right to have an abortion at the expense of fully-developed, unborn babies who are capable of surviving outside the womb. Partial-birth abortion is totally unnecessary, and the law banning it is good. The theoretical argument is a fiction that an exception should exist in any ban against partial-birth abortion in order to protect the life of the mother--this objection is a fiction! Obstetricians have refuted the claim that a partial birth abortion either saves the life of pregnant women or provides any significant benefit to their health.
What is needed in the judiciary are judges who are not activists--who will neither improperly expand nor contract the Constitution. We need Justices who will Return the law-making function of the government to Congress and to the States, and re-establish the Courts as merely the interpreters of the Constitution.
XIII. Education--the Key to the Future
The closeness of the 2004 election highlights the need to educate society--to refute the many myths and lies about conservatives, and to expose the bias and hatred of extremist left. Education is the antidote for the ignorance that breeds and sustains the anti-conservative firebrands. And the key to a lasting education is to educate the rising generation, which is now in our nation's schools. This is a formidable task, with liberals in control of most of our universities and many of our states' school systems. But as daunting as the task may be, we must tackle it and pursue it diligently until truth prevails.
1. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) reported that Saddam Hussein had 380 tons of explosives at Al Qaqaa. The IAEA reported that it had marked these explosives for identification. However, by the time American troops arrived at Al Qaqaa, these explosives were akeady gone. On April 10, 2003, the 101' Airborne found no IAEA-marked explosives when they arrived in Al Qaqaa. And a few days prior to this, when the Third Infantry Division arrived in Al Qaqaa, they had also searched and found no lALA-marked explosives. See The Washington Post, October 28, 2004 and The Washington Times, October 26 and 28, 2004.
2. The mainstream media regard FOX News as being biased towards conservatives. They further decry the condition of a nation that now can select to receive its news information from a source that has a conservative bias. However, this is ill-informed, condescending and erroneous. As one who does tune in to FOX News with some regularity, I find that it includes biased discussion from both liberals and conservatives. But their news programs often covers news stories for which the liberal media refuses to give time. For example, the mainstream press refused to give fair treatment to the Swift Boat Vets, who were infuriated with Senator Kerry for the false and exaggerated testimony that he gave to Congress in 1971 about the atrocities that he arid other American soldiers committed in Vietnam. In attempting to ignore the Swift Boat Vets, the mainstream press attempted to characterize these vets as attempting to discredit Kerry ~.or not being worthy of his purple hearts. But that was not the main thrust of what the Swift Boat Vets were saying--they felt Kerry was "Unfit for Command" because his testimony before Congress betrayed his fellow veterans, including those who were being held captive in Vietnam because his testimony gave aid, comfort and encouragement to our enemy, the Viet Cong, at the very time when we were at war against them. This, to the Swift Boat Vets, was unforgivable, and was a valid issue in the presidential campaign, as a factor in whether or not Senator Kerry is fit to be Commander-in-Chief. And this charge is also pertinent because Senator Kerry's on-going criticism of President Bush's handling of the war in Iraq crossed over the line of propriety, as Kerry said the U.S. should not have attacked Iraq ("the wrong war, at the wrong place, at the wrong time"); that President Bush misled the nation and went to war for bad reasons; that President Bush and his leaders were responsible for the atrocities at Abe Ghraib; and that President Bush was responsible for alienating our allies. Thus, John F. Kerry, ended up doing in the presidential campaign of 2004, the very thing he had done before the Congressional committee in 1971--he was falsely criticizing his country and its president in time of war for wrongly waging a war. It is amazing that President Bush never stated this case against Senator Kerry. But it was clearly relevant, and the refusal of the mainstream press to give any meaningful air time to this is proof of its liberal bias. And with regard to the Abu Ghraib matter, by the time we reached October, 2004, it was manifestly clear that the abuse of Iraqi prisoners was not directed by the policies of President Bush, but was the result of the repulsive, illegal acts of a few individuals. The responsible American guards were being prosecuted and punished. Nevertheless, on October 15, 2004, as The Washington Post was sensing that the public was no longer sufficiently angry at President Bush for these abuses, it made its lead editorial, "Remember Abu Chraib?" The Post did this for blatant partisan reasons; The Post was not satisfied that the nation had now sorted out this problem and was moving on to other issues without blaming President Bush. Determined to do all it could to make the President suffer in the polls for Abu Ghraib, The Post saw fit to resurrect the story to attempt to slam the President. The primary effect of this partisan act was to again confirm the bias of The Washington Post. Finally, while the mainstream media may find FOX News to have a dangerous conservative slant, I often find that some of its programs are still weighted too much to the left--both through the time given to liberal guests and because some of its news anchors and talk show hosts have a liberal bias; three examples are Shepherd Smith, Gretta Van Susteren and Geraldo Rivera. Based upon my observations, those who complain that FOX News has a conservative bias, don't know what they are talking about. The fact that the network does not have a pro-liberal bias does not give the network a conservative bias.
The citations for these cases are: Roe V Wade, 410 U.S. 113(1973); Griswoldv. Connecticut, 381 U.S. 479 (1965); FisenMadt v Baird, 405 U~S. 438 (1 972); Troxel V. Grapwille, 530 U.S. 57(2000).
© 2006 C. Paul Smith
Contact the Web Master, Jimmy Smith, at jrs76@hotmail.com
or visit his website at www.jimmyandheather.com
Contact the Web Master, Jimmy Smith, at jrs76@hotmail.com
or visit his website at www.jimmyandheather.com