His proposal last month, as shredded by liberal political commentator Rachel Maddow (see seven-minute video below, h/t Patrick Madrid), is to suspend the U.S. Constitution. His idea is to have a sort of preventative, "prolonged detention" of people the government thinks might pose a threat to the country. Seems like a good plan for the immediate Gitmo problem, but is that the kind of precedent we really want to set?
It reminds me an awful lot of that famous dialogue in the movie, "A Man for All Seasons." St. Thomas More chastises William Roper for saying he'd "cut down every law in England" to "get after the Devil." More responds:
And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned 'round on you, where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat? This country is planted thick with laws, from coast to coast, Man's laws, not God's! And if you cut them down, and you're just the man to do it, do you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I'd give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety's sake!
Suspending key provisions of the Constitution to protect us from potential threats of assumed terrorists may sound like good idea, but we end up cutting down the laws that protect all of us. Here's a hypothetical: What if the government decided to hold pro-lifers in "prolonged detention" because of their alleged propensity to murder abortionists?
Let's give even the Devil the benefit of law.
