What I want

It seems that everyone is proclaiming what the voters meant on November 7. I won't speak for everyone else, at least not this time. This time, all I have to offer is what I want. I did vote, after all, for all the good it did us.

I want my leaders to display loyalty to no party, no race, no bloc of voters; nor to the media, nor to bloggers, nor to campaign contributors, nor even to me. I instead demand that they display in their every word and action loyalty to our nation and its historical values.

I want a government limited both in the services it provides and in the obedience it demands.

I want leaders who encourage individualism in self reliance, self control, self defense, and self expression.

I want wars that are fought in defense of American interests and ideals, but I want those wars fought to the end. I want leaders who have served under arms when young, so they will dread war when they are old.

---

I want my government to be limited. This is not some empty slogan; the limits are written down for all to see. And yet some choose to ignore those limits.

I want judges who leave to the legislature the power to legislate. I want no attempt to anticipate exceptional and hypothetical situations, or to base our law on their fancy of what might happen. I want judges who will decide cases.

I want the Federal government to interpose itself only when there is a clear conflict between States. I don't want it to assert its authority based on some hypothetical economy of action, implicitly relying on the legendary efficiency of the Federal government.

I want a government that knows that "interstate commerce" means commerce between states, not the tip I give a waitress in my own neighborhood diner, and not the grain a farmer grows to feed his own cows.

I want a government that defends life, from the moment of conception to the last sweet breath of an old man in his bed. I want no one, neither parent nor doctor, neither judge nor thug, to bring about the death of another. I want that decision left to a jury after a good long trial, though I have qualms about it, even then.

I want a government that defends liberty by ignoring what it can ignore, supporting only what it must, and asking only what it has a need to know.

I want leaders who obey the laws they pass, not defend the right of a corrupt official to store bribe money in his freezer.

I want the freedom to carry a gun on my person in whatever public place I choose.

I want the borders secured with a tall fence and a wide gate. I want anyone who will be loyal to my country and obey its few, simple, laws to make my country his own. I want to know who those people are who come in the wide gate, but as soon as I know they are Americans, I want to forget their origin.

I want to be able to offend someone and not end up in jail. I want the right to write in public what I would speak in private without being dragged in front of a judge for the content of my crazy ideas.

I want a government that ignores the color of a man's skin, and not to care generally whether that man is a man or something else.

I want the government to ignore what happens between consenting adults behind closed doors. I also want my government to recognize only marriages between a man and a woman.

I want a government that balances it budget by cutting taxes and by cutting spending.

And if I don't get all of that soon, there will be hell to pay on November 4, 2008.

(Cross-posted at RedState.com)

Sphere: Related Content