An Email Conversation on the ACLU and Civil Liberties
Posted on September 20, 2008
Original email I received:
Dear Jay
I probably have some agreement with you that the ACLU takes seperation of church and state way too far.I don’t see that a prayer at a graduation is any violation of a so-called seperation of church and state.Jay my problem arises when we look at some of the ultra conservative ideas to expand we have seen lately from the Bush Administration when it comes to shredding our Fourth Amendment and on those issues I’m thankful for the ACLU.In addition with our economy going into a tailspin in part because of the supply-side economics and sillly idea that the markets can regulate themselves of BUsh and MCCain.What I”m trying to say Jay is that the GOP and far right wing pro corporate agenda of the right is almost as sickening as some on the hyper secular left that you talk about.Look we are in a mess Jay, and its not democrats its the 6 years of GOP policy from 2000-2006 so when you combine your rehetoric against the ACLU with rhetoric attacking Obama and complimenting Bush and McCain you have destroy your credibility.TThere are many on the left who are not part of the secular left and would have some agreement with you but any effort to join the GOP team and group together absolutely destroys your credibility and doesn’t help our cause to fight for more relisgous liberties and unlike you something i cherish “civil liberties.Travis
My response:
I’m gonna guess that you are a conservative leaning libertarian. I could be wrong, with the way you talk about the “right wing” though. However, I proudly call myself a conservative, and embarrassingly call myself a Republican. It isn’t about party. I don’t disagree with everything the ACLU does. I just think they are a fraud and dangerously misguided far to the left. I believe in civil liberties. I just think the ACLU take those liberties too far, to a dangerous level. Their advocacy of having child molesters live across the street from playgrounds and elementary schools is too far for me. Their advocacy that looking at child porn should be freedom of speech is too far. Their hypocrisy in fighting against listening in to phone calls to known terrorist over privacy issues while keeping a database of their member’s personal financial history is too far. Their attacks on free speech for Christians are too far, and on top of that hypocrisy they have restricted their own board member’s speech. I don’t want to stop the defending of the bill of rights. I want to stop the perversion of the Constitution. I also want to stop taxpayer funding paying the ACLU’s cases they convince left wing judges of, that the majority of American taxpayers don’t agree with. I’m tired of these legal groups destroying the foundation of our Constitution. If homosexuals want equal rights, then convince enough people to amend the Constitution like they did for abolishing slavery. They only hurt their cause when they convince judges to push it on a population not ready to accept it. Then they only get reactions from politicians ready to represent the will of the people who put Constitutional amendments to ban such things before the people. The people react, just as you would expect, and it makes everything that much harder. They hurt their own cause by going the route of the judiciary. The ACLU is a partisan organization that should not receive any tax exemption as they do. They separate their organization into two so they can lobby and play the courts. They are evil.
Should I have said more? I’ll update this post if and when I get a response. In the meantime, chime in with your responses.
» Filed Under 1st Amendment, ACLU, Activist Judges, Bill Of Rights, Church And State, Domestic Enemies, Moral Relativism, News, Revisionism, Secular Humanism, Socialism, Stupidity, U.S. Constitution
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17 Responses to “An Email Conversation on the ACLU and Civil Liberties”
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I would like to know what unreasonable searches have been conducted that violated the Fourth Amendment.
As for the financial institutions, let us not play games with it was the right or the left. It was ll of them. The free market always works so long as people follow the law.
President Bush and John McCain tried to tighten control over Fannie and Freddie and the effort was thwarted by Democrats like Barney Frank who said there were no problems. Many of the people who worked there were Democrats from Clinton’s administration and they got rich while defrauding the system.
There are controls in place but when Congress passes laws that force institutions to make loans to people who cannot pay them then we have problems.
The responsibility for bad loans falls on the people who made them. The ones borrowing and the ones lending share the blame though banks are weary of saying no, especially to certain minority groups, lest they have Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson protesting them.
There is lots of blame to throw around and all one needs to do is look at the names of the people who took their money.
But free markets work, government control causes nothing good. Government has never run anything efficiently or under budget.
Unfortunately I think there are times when an organization such as the ACLU has a place in our society. Our Constitution is made up of checks and balances. If there was no one to quell the sometimes too activist impulses of the “Religious Right” they could become an American Taliban.
I think the job the ACLU does is distasteful, but the dirty job that it is, someone must do it. They have just as much right to protest a Christmas display as we have the right to protest something like the Maplethorp exhibit.
Maybe we are blaming the wrong enemy here. The ACLU would not have the power it has if it weren’t for activist judges who don’t give a you know what about the Constitution. If we had judges who did not believe the Constitution was a living, breathing, and evolving entity to be changed at whim, the ACLU would have no power.
Their success lies solely on the soul of judges who use the Bench to make laws. If every judge was like a Roberts, Powell, or Alito we wouldn’t be in this mess.
SJR
The Pink Flamingo
Travis: When I read your “pro-corporate agenda,” supply-side economics, and see the economy blamed on Republicans tied to 2000-2006, and “attacks on Obama,”…with all due respect, it’s not Jay’s credibility that’s diminished here.
Do some research before you blame today’s credit crisis solely on the Republicans. As Hillary said, you are embracing the willing suspension of disbelief (or something similar).
Jay has stated his position very well.
Maggie
Given the history of the ACLU, no, there has never been a need for an organization dedicated to undermining and altering a free nation like the USA so as to change it to a Communist one.
This is all part of the anti-Christian agenda of the ACLU, they are simply trying to impose a state-mandated atheism along with every other Communist policy. It didn’t work over for over 70 years in Russia and it won’t work now. But how much damage can the ACLU do in the meantime?
“…but the dirty job that it is, someone must do it” Really? I don’t think so.
Jay, your reply was excellent. I’m going to cross post it to Radarsite. Thank you.
rg
When it comes to the sins of the ACLU and the sins of the Republican Party any sane person must admit they have both sinned. But when it comes to magnitude of those sins and the kinds of sins I’ll take the ACLU over the GOP any day. Liberty is a consistent whole. Neither the ACLU or the GOP apply it consistently. But the GOP has done far more damage with their inconsistent application than the ACLU could ever hope to do.
In addition it seems to me the ACLU has improved on issues where they were bad. At the same time the GOP has become significantly worse. The direction in which they are headed also speaks more in favor of the ACLU than the GOP.
CLS, name one liberty the GOP has taken from you. Name one right the GOP has taken from you. Now consider the ACLU defends child pornographers and pedophiles attacks traditional christmas displays and cities which choose to place a cross in memory of fallen soldiers where all can see them and remember the sacrifice of these brave souls who gave you the freedom to be such a simplistic piece of grabbastic primordial pus and you can plainly see (if you can even string logical thoughts together) the ACLU is plainly evil, anti american and should be sued into bankruptcy.
The founders of the ACLU, cls (BTW does that stand for Completely Loony Simpleton?) said there were for the abolition of private property (a cornerstone of our country) among other very anti american ideas…and you come in HERE defending them?
Luckily I don’t cuss on this site.
Not to blast your argument, Jay, because it was valid, but the 13th Amendment to the US Constitution was enacted only after a full out, bloody war, and voted on only by the North and the proxy representatives the North appointed to “represent” the South. It wouldn’t be a good example of using legitimate means of changing a law.
I take issue with saying the “South” when talking about folks that were pro-slavery. Joe Biden represents a slave state, so that argument just doesn’t hold water. It was most certainly Democrats that kept blacks enslaved, and not just Southern Democrats.
And odd how Travis recognizes the timeframe when the economy hit the skids, but then places the blame on the consistent entity in charge rather than the one that changed. Wouldn’t it be more intelligent to say, “You know, the economy started a nose-dive right around November 2006, what could possibly be the reason?” And then look at the fact that minimum wage has gone up twice, there were talks about nationalizing the petroleum industry, there were discussions about rolling back the tax cuts, the list is endless. Place blame where it belongs.
That said, I am glad Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are/have collapsed. Maybe we can start to focus on the absolute WRONGNESS of government intervention in the economy. But it doesn’t look like it with 600 billion getting shelled out to prop up those businesses that have been decimated by Barry Obama’s economic advisors.
Oh c’mon, it was the party of Lincoln that wanted to abolish slavery; the civil rights movement was heralded by Republicans, democrats voted against the Civil Rights Act. of 1964
You may or may not recall that democrats were slave owners in the South. Read up on the true racist history of democrats at the Black Republican Association website.
Affirmative Action is merely an extension of that racist ideology; and it keeps people of color down by applying different rules to different groups; even if those people are within families. I can recall a family who’d adopted children of different races, and they were appalled when it came time for the kids to go to college, how differently they were teated simply because of their race. That’s a real hard thing to deal with – why one kid is favored over another simply because of the color of their skin.
Jay’s response was very well-done.
There is no excusing what the ACLU is accomplishing overall. They masquerade as ‘do-gooders’ who are defending ‘civil rights’, but I don’t think cop killers, child molesters, members of NAMBLA, and other social rejects, criminals and terrorists deserve rights over regular citizens.
It destroys the safety of Americans when we can’t allow our kids to play in the playground across the street because we know a child molester – a registered sex offender – is living nearby.
The ACLU is a very destructive organization; and lots of lawyers have defected after they realized what is really going on under the guise of ‘civil liberties’.
Jay shows the facts not just says them. Just as everyone keeps pointing the finger at the Republicans its the democrats who are taking this country to the cleaners. And i think i remember the Democratic in charge congress saying they would do something. But seems they are more about taken there vacations and putting tax payers money in their pocket then fixing problems in this country.
Just as with the IRAQ war Bill Clinton did the same thing and preached the same thing about WMD’s when he attacked Iraq. Only different between Clinton and Bush is that Bush finished the job! Thats why the democrats are so mad. Because bush went in and stopped a country from doing the murders it has done under a leader that was a murder of the world and his own people. The WMD’s was not there in the Bill Clinton day!
This is an example of why your blog is one of the most important ones on the internet. The ACLU is a daily unfettered attack against the basis for our life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. They take millions of dollars away from the American people in lawsuits against schools and municipalities, not to mention non-profit organizations. They are a wheel in the legislate-by-judicial-fiat machine. They are a menace to society. Thanks for continually exposing their evil actions!
radar
I cringe when I see unsourced attacks on the presidency (bush and the 4th amendment) regardless of who is sitting there. The ACLU is, sadly, a necessary evil sometimes with overreaching government, but as John says, it keeps tabs on its members, but rails against the government trying to stop terrorists by listening in to suspicious phone calls.
John, good response and on target. Please keep it up. For all of our sakes!
Both writers have a point.
Jay, at the end of the day, you have a choice. You can be a site whose focus is attacking the ACLU for its manifold abuses. You document them well. If that’s truly your focus, however, then this needs to be a non-partisan site, and stuff that’s unrelated to that agenda needs to go.
Or you can be a conservative/GOP site that happens to dislike the ACLU. Which means you accept up front that you won’t reach people who aren’t already at least leaning Republican.
Full freedom to write, or full effectiveness against the ACLU. You can have only one. Choose.
All it took for me was their defense of NAMBLA.
Unconscionable.
*Cross posted
I think your reply made the point. No organization is perfect. As such, when it gets bigger, its harder to control. Perhaps ACLU has become to big for itself.
The other problem is, while the ACLU has it’s place, groups within the ACLU are radical and those groups blemish the whole.
Well said Jay.
As for the emailer… Im not so sure I would have gave them a response.