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I Sense Pride in Our Nation I Have Found Lacking for the Last Eight Years’

  

Category:  News & Politics

Via:  xxjefferson51  •  7 years ago  •  71 comments

I Sense Pride in Our Nation I Have Found Lacking for the Last Eight Years’
Sheriff David Clarke began his closing address to CPAC 2017 as he knew everyone familiar with him would expect, by declaring “Blue Lives Matter in America!”
“To what purpose did our Founding Fathers and the soldiers of our great Continental Army strive? Did they work to form the horrible mistake of what progressive Democrats call the Great Society – a place of cradle-to-grave reliance on the benevolent providence of government as the father, the mother, the breadwinner, and the teacher?” Clarke asked as he settled down to the primary business of his speech.

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“I think not,” he answered. “You see, General Washington was rightly and firstly proud of the nation that he believed lay within the grasp of the colonists, as they struggled to tear it away from the corpulent arms of an overbearing King of England. George Washington wrote to Benjamin Franklin that no country upon Earth had it more in its power to attain these blessings than united America.”

Clarke quoted extensively from Washington, Lincoln, Jefferson, Ronald Reagan, and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in his address. His overall theme was a call to arms; his closing request was for CPAC attendees to go out and fight. It was, in some respects, the type of closing speech one might have expected to hear if Republicans had lost the 2016 presidential election. Clarke’s purpose was to impress upon his conservative audience that they faced determined opposition from the Left, and would need to remain in fighting trim themselves if they wanted President Donald Trump to implement the policies they voted for.

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Clarke stressed that Washington and his revolutionaries “never intended to build a nation to be ruled from a throne room or a centralized government.”

“They weren’t building a land where Boston, or Philadelphia, or New York City, or even today’s capital city that bears his name would dictate terms and conditions to the American people,” he continued. “No, their efforts to secure the basic human rights endowed by the Creator and formation of a most limited government, instituted justly by men and deriving its limited powers from the consent of the governed. They embraced the concept of self-rule.”

“They fought the tyranny of the throne, it’s true. They fought to end the abuse of the colonies at the hand of an uncaring and unsympathetic master, but seemingly forgotten yet chief among the complaints outlined by Jefferson in his great Declaration was the refusal of the monarchy to craft and enforce needed laws – wholesome and necessary to the public good, said Jefferson, and of immediate and pressing importance, they told the king of England. They law, they said, a law that works, a respect and reverence to the rule of law,” said Clarke.

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“These goals were as key at the founding of our great Republic as the need to satisfy our thirst for freedom and religion, and assembly, and a free and unfettered media that we keeping hearing about so much today,” he added wryly.

Clarke used the Civil War as another example of the importance of law, making a compelling argument that passing and fairly enforcing good laws is as essential to the maintenance of liberty as repealing bad laws and scaling back the power of overweening government.

“Lincoln knew the failure to adhere to that standard in our shared American life would surely result in our surrender – first to the immorality of convenience, then to the sloth of inaction, and finally to the shame of irrelevance,” he proclaimed.

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Clarke quoted from George Washington to support the idea that America has legitimate needs as a nation-state, and requires a certain degree of unity to endure, despite our many important differences: “We are either a united people or we are not. If it is the former, then let us in all matters of general concern act as a nation which has national objects to promote, and a national character to support. If we are not, then let us no longer act a farce by pretending to it.”

Clarke asked:

I ask, are we now acting out the farce that President Washington predicted? We have matters under consideration in this capital city, most notably concerning immigration law and its enforcement, that even the most jaded among us would begrudgingly concede are of national importance to everyone. We have border states, most notably on our southern border, that have to date disproportionately borne the brunt and the burden of our failure to act over the past decades. But is there a state in this union in which the impact of that failure is not keenly felt by the American people?

“Yet we seem to have fallen to a place and a time in our national discourse where even the mere restatement and affirmation of laws long ago crafted, and duly enacted by our Constitutional republic’s legislature – laws that were formed and codified in the people’s house, by the people’s representatives – is now considered controversial,” he observed. He went on:

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In the executive memoranda on immigration laws attested to this past week, no new laws were created. No group was put at risk without affording them due process. The rights of not one of our citizens, even in a land where president, senator, and farmer stand shoulder to shoulder as equals, was imperiled in the least. Instead, we merely restated the laws that were, what they have been, and voiced an intent to see them upheld fairly, impartially, and with a haste born of necessity.

“And yet, in our modern times, that is viewed in some circles as oppressive, as controversial, and as wrong,” he noted, adding a sarcastic “Seriously?”

He called it a “perversion of thought” to say that Americans are against immigrants. “Do some critics truly believe that we have become that Orwellian nightmare that views all Americans as equal, yet with some more equal than others? Come on now, seriously?” he asked.

He said those who oppose the fair enforcement of duly passed immigration laws offer only “lawlessness, obstruction, and chaos” in other areas of American life as well.

“They offer no morality, and certainly no courage,” Clarke said. “They offer only appeasement and the false currencies of concession and popularity over the virtues of morality and certainty.”

He drew a comparison between appeasement in foreign policy and appeasement to domestic lawlessness, warning we could not expect strong support for the rule of law from “liberal legislators” who “mark as their key data point in crafting policy how many Facebook likes their pages get, or what the latest Internet polling shows, or how many smiling emojis follow their every move.”

“I for one find no safe harbor or vista-like view on the middle ground, wheedling or seeking for others to announce the virtue of my actions,” declared Clarke, whose history of boldly confronting controversy over his words and actions certainly support that claim. “You see I, like President Reagan, see things not only as Left and Right, but as forward and backward – swimming sometimes against a powerful tide, or simply treading water, fundamentally failing our duty to make any choice at all by voting ‘present.’”

This was an important part of his overall theme about keeping all hands on deck, and conservatism at battle stations, rather than allowing intense opposition from the Left and media to paralyze Congress and the administration. He emphasized the point with an especially apt Reagan quote the audience adored: “I suggest to you that there is no Left or Right, only an up and a down. Up to the maximum of individual freedom consistent with law and order, or down to the ant heap of totalitarianism.”

Clarke said that as a career police officer, he understood the importance of public servants respecting the public that grants them authority through the consent of the governed.

“We the people do not follow established rules simply because a law enforcement officer is present to enforce them, but because of our basic love of, trust of, and reliance on our fellow citizens,” he argued. He quoted Supreme Court Justice Felix Frankfurter’s admonition that “if one man can be allowed to determine for himself what the law is, then every man can. That means first chaos, and then tyranny.”

“American law enforcement officers have always understood this simple truth,” Clarke said. “They spend their life’s work, as I have thus far, exemplifying my faith in, my belief in, and commitment to our American system of justice – a system renowned the world over for the provisions of individual due process as a right endowed in each of us by our Creator.”

“The rule of law doesn’t divide us,” he said. “It binds us together in our great American life with shared behaviors, beliefs, and manners. I call it, as do many of you, ‘American exceptionalism.’ We are a nation of limited government in which everyone willfully, and as a matter of civic duty, must obey the law. And the value derived for the small price paid of observance of the common law is the greatest treasure known to mankind: freedom. Sweet freedom.”

“Freedom is why we get up in the morning and tend the fields. It is why we stay up late at night watching foreign markets. It sustains us. It feeds us. And once we have tasted it, we can never have enough to be satisfied,” he said.

“As a conservative I believe with all my heart, that in furtherance of the common good, freedom means you decide your destiny. You, your family, your household, your neighborhood, your small town, your state – and yes, in those few matters of national scope, your nation,” Clarke said. “To cede as a matter of simple course of expediency, to cede those powers too quickly or injudiciously to Washington D.C. is just plain wrong, and it always has been.”

He quoted Reagan again: “We have come to a time for choosing… either we accept the responsibility for our own destiny, or we abandon the American revolution and confess that an intellectual belief in a far-distant capitol can plan our lives for us better than we can plan our own lives.”

Clarke exclaimed, winning the longest and strongest applause of the hour:

How refreshing is that simple concept, that we who run our lives know the course of our own destiny better than some congresswoman from California, better than some judge from Joplin may know it sitting in a mahogany-paneled office in Washington, making the decisions that can undermine all of our great efforts. How refreshing to see a return to that respectful thought of the importance of self-determination, and to turn away from the conceit and arrogance that was its predecessor at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue before January 20th, 2017!

In President Donald Trump we have chosen a leader – a leader who I expect many of you in this room well know I both campaigned and vigorously supported for the highest office in this land. And he was a candidate that I’m certain many in this room also supported, and some may have at first opposed in some measure. That’s fine. That’s the great nature of this republic. We have choices, and we decide. However, in President Trump I sense a return now to those key virtues first extolled in that letter to a tyrant monarch in 1776. I sense a pride in our nation, and a voice to that pride that I have found lacking for the last eight years.

“We were constantly told by former President Obama that America needed to humble itself. He told us humility is a virtue. But false humility is an affront to the senses, and pride in the greatness and might of our nation has never been a sin,” he argued.

“President George Washington himself observed, upon the occasion of his first inaugural, ‘There is a rank due to the United States among nations which will be withheld, if not absolutely lost, by the reputation of weakness.’ Consider those words once more: ‘A rank due the United States of America.’ Allow me to translate that language from 1789 to 2017. It means: ‘Put America first,’” he said.

Clarke faulted the mainstream media for “mocking and taunting” President Trump’s America First vision, portraying it as “dark and feral.” He said:

No, it’s not. Yet those who held the office before President Trump would rise up from their graves and nod in agreement with the importance of our shared effort and potential for reward that President Trump offered us when he said, ‘We the citizens of America are now joined in a great national effort to rebuild our country, restore its promise not for an elite few, but for all of our people.’ He said together, we will determine the course of America and the world for many years to come. President Trump reminded us we will face challenges, we will confront hardships, but we will get the job done.

Clarke said in closing:

Ladies and gentlemen, today is our moment of truth, our point of no return. The choices we need make at this moment are opposed by entrenched interests. The ‘resistance’ looms. They attack our motives, they assail our beliefs, they decry our notion of justice, they proclaim the high ground of virtue, and they threaten upheaval if not given their way. What will history show we did with our moment of truth? Did we stand and fight, or did we cut and run?

“Ladies and gentlemen, this is my challenge to you. These are your marching orders: Go forth to stand and fight,” he said. http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2017/02/25/sheriff-david-clarke-i-sense-pride-in-our-nation-i-have-found-lacking-for-the-last-eight-years/

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XXJefferson51
Senior Guide
link   seeder  XXJefferson51    7 years ago

I'm proud to be an American!   God bless the USA!

 
 
 
XXJefferson51
Senior Guide
link   seeder  XXJefferson51    7 years ago

Obama didn't want us to be proud of our exceptional nation during his two terms.  He just wanted to transform us from exceptional to less than great.  

 
 
 
Kavika
Professor Principal
link   Kavika   replied to  XXJefferson51   7 years ago

If the author of the article needs to put up Sheriff David Clark as a ''role model'' he/they have really sunk into the proverbial shit hole.

 
 
 
XXJefferson51
Senior Guide
link   seeder  XXJefferson51  replied to  Kavika   7 years ago

Clark is a great American.  He loves our country and upholds the law well where he has jurisdiction.  He's one of the best democrats in all of America.  

 
 
 
Randy
Sophomore Participates
link   Randy  replied to  XXJefferson51   7 years ago

Trump doesn't want us to be proud of our exceptional nation during his one month.  He just wants to transform us from exceptional to less than great.

There xx. Fixed it for you.

 
 
 
XXJefferson51
Senior Guide
link   seeder  XXJefferson51  replied to  Randy   7 years ago

Take your fix and shove up your self where the good lord split ya!  

 
 
 
Randy
Sophomore Participates
link   Randy  replied to  XXJefferson51   7 years ago

Laugh

 

 
 
 
XXJefferson51
Senior Guide
link   seeder  XXJefferson51  replied to  Randy   7 years ago

vomitcrazyliarchicken

 
 
 
Randy
Sophomore Participates
link   Randy  replied to  XXJefferson51   7 years ago

I sense a lack of pride in you that has been missing for about 8 years. patience

 
 
 
Aeonpax
Freshman Silent
link   Aeonpax    7 years ago

The people in Milwaukee County, think Clarke is a freakin idiot. He is under investigation for a number of improprieties, not to mention damning lawsuits against his sheriff's department.He will not be re-elected this upcoming cycle.

 
 
 
JohnRussell
Professor Principal
link   JohnRussell  replied to  Aeonpax   7 years ago

He has a big future as a right wing talk radio host. 

 
 
 
Steve Ott
Professor Quiet
link   Steve Ott  replied to  Aeonpax   7 years ago
 
 
 
Randy
Sophomore Participates
link   Randy  replied to  Steve Ott   7 years ago

And I used to feel sorry for Maricopa County, Arizona...until this last election that is. However this guy takes the proverbial cake.

 
 
 
Randy
Sophomore Participates
link   Randy    7 years ago

I am very proud to be an American and have been all of my life. However the past few months are the only time I have felt any embarrassment about how our nation looks to the rest of the world.  The past few months are the only time when I have felt that the White House is being run like a really poorly run cheap circus with Trump as the head clown. Well, OK, so there were a few times when George W. was in office, but nothing like this. Trump is unbelievably embarrassing, but still, I am proud to be an American.

 
 
 
XXJefferson51
Senior Guide
link   seeder  XXJefferson51  replied to  Randy   7 years ago

The last eight years we had a snowflake circus in the whitehouse headed by one who wanted to rule over us by decree.  

 

 
 
 
deepwaterdon
Freshman Silent
link   deepwaterdon  replied to  Randy   7 years ago

Glad you mentioned W., Randy. I'll 'Trump' you one and raise you with a Nixon, Haldeman, and Erlichman!

 
 
 
XXJefferson51
Senior Guide
link   seeder  XXJefferson51  replied to  deepwaterdon   7 years ago

And then there was Clinton and his escapades and lord Barry the most transparent dear leader...

 
 
 
Randy
Sophomore Participates
link   Randy  replied to  deepwaterdon   7 years ago

Glad you mentioned W., Randy. I'll 'Trump' you one and raise you with a Nixon, Haldeman, and Erlichman!

Hmmm...all I'm holding for a scandal is Trump, a Bannon, a Miller, a Sessions and a Spicer. Any good? (I do have a Conway as a hole card)

 
 
 
Perrie Halpern R.A.
Professor Principal
link   Perrie Halpern R.A.    7 years ago

Except when people on your side of the political aisle do it to me.  Then it's a-ok

XX we have been through this before.

No, it is not OK, but you never report but always complain that nothing is done. If you want something to be done, write me or get me on chat. 

 
 
 
lady in black
Professor Quiet
link   lady in black    7 years ago

Are you for real.......sick of the Let's make America Great Again, Real Americans, American Pride......This country has always been great, we are all "real americans" I have always been proud of America....

 
 
 
Krishna
Professor Expert
link   Krishna    7 years ago

 I have always been proud of America....

Me too.

Well, except for one small part of America.

The small part that keeps posting some of these totally inane articles... and ridiculous comments.

Stupid!

 
 
 
XXJefferson51
Senior Guide
link   seeder  XXJefferson51  replied to  Krishna   7 years ago

Its too bad you believe so much of America that disagrees with you here are inane, ridiculous, and stupid.  Typical talking down to condescension from the left.  I never say things like that about members here who are my ideological opposition.  

 
 
 
Randy
Sophomore Participates
link   Randy  replied to  XXJefferson51   7 years ago

 I never say things like that about members here who are my ideological opposition. 

The funny or perhaps more sad thing is that he really believes that.

 
 
 
pat wilson
Professor Participates
link   pat wilson  replied to  XXJefferson51   7 years ago

I never say things like that about members here who are my ideological opposition.  

How convenient ! You can seed a stream of articles with the nastiest, most vicious titles, words that rip your "ideological opposition" to shreds and sit back and be the innocent messenger.

 
 
 
Randy
Sophomore Participates
link   Randy  replied to  pat wilson   7 years ago

applause

 
 
 
XXJefferson51
Senior Guide
link   seeder  XXJefferson51  replied to  pat wilson   7 years ago

The headlines and the articles are news or opinion articles from elsewhere seeded here.  They were wrirtten by an author not myself and published in print or on line for a publication not mine.  

 
 
 
XXJefferson51
Senior Guide
link   seeder  XXJefferson51  replied to  XXJefferson51   7 years ago

I also seed straight news and policy articles on a variety of topics yet no one either complains about those or comments on them.  Also there are lefty seeders who hit us on the right just as hard and you don't see us conservatives complaining, whining, or getting our underwear all twisted into a wad over them. 

 

 
 
 
XXJefferson51
Senior Guide
link   seeder  XXJefferson51  replied to  pat wilson   7 years ago

"Some here resort to personal attacks precisely to prevent and derail actual discussion of a topic they disagree with or don't like.  They think that the headline or the content of a seeded article is a personal attack against them or everything they believe.  Sad, really."  

 
 
 
Sean Treacy
Professor Principal
link   Sean Treacy    7 years ago

Homerun of a speech last night. 

 
 
 
deepwaterdon
Freshman Silent
link   deepwaterdon    7 years ago

laughing dude

 
 
 
XXJefferson51
Senior Guide
link   seeder  XXJefferson51  replied to  deepwaterdon   7 years ago

You can laugh in your tears all you want don, but it was by all objective standards a great speech last night.  

 
 
 
Cerenkov
Professor Silent
link   Cerenkov  replied to  XXJefferson51   7 years ago

Great speech. Too bad the liberals want our government to fail. Sad.

 
 
 
XXJefferson51
Senior Guide
link   seeder  XXJefferson51  replied to  Cerenkov   7 years ago

Sad and anti American.  

 
 
 
Krishna
Professor Expert
link   Krishna    7 years ago

There are a few really great people here.

But the others?

Well, let's just say you deserve each other!!!

Its really tempting to leave... (Did you know-- there actually other other sites on the Internet. Hmmmmm...something I'll have to think about....)

 
 
 
Randy
Sophomore Participates
link   Randy  replied to  Krishna   7 years ago

I hope you stay. Sometimes we disagree, but sometimes we agree and when we agree we really agree. That's a good thing!

 
 
 
Perrie Halpern R.A.
Professor Principal
link   Perrie Halpern R.A.  replied to  Randy   7 years ago

Its really tempting to leave... (Did you know-- there actually other other sites on the Internet. Hmmmmm...something I'll have to think about....)

Yeah, but none of them have me! 

 
 
 
Randy
Sophomore Participates
link   Randy  replied to  Perrie Halpern R.A.   7 years ago

Oh Boy! And once you've had Perrie...you never go back to anyone else!!!

 
 
 
Krishna
Professor Expert
link   Krishna    7 years ago

Yeah, but none of them have me! 

Good point!

maybe I'll do a "McCann Quit"-- sort of a Hotel California thing. 

keep quitting...but strangely always end up being around!

Heh :^)

 
 
 
Randy
Sophomore Participates
link   Randy  replied to  Krishna   7 years ago

Just so you're always around.

 
 
 
Krishna
Professor Expert
link   Krishna    7 years ago

But meanwhile-- what are we going to do to some of the mentally challenged folks here-- the ones who are so stupid they can't figure out how to have a discussion without resorting to personal attacks? (I can't figure out if they are resorting to being nasty on purpose-- because they are just really sleazy people? Or just aren't intelligent to have a real discussion of the actual topic rather than discussing the other participants the participants? Either they are just basically nasty people-- or just people who aren't very bright?

Oh well... time for bed. TTYL.

 
 
 
XXJefferson51
Senior Guide
link   seeder  XXJefferson51  replied to  Krishna   7 years ago

Some here resort to personal attacks precisely to prevent and derail actual discussion of a topic they disagree with or don't like.  They think that the headline or the content of a seeded article is a personal attack against them or everything they believe.  Sad, really.  

 
 
 
Randy
Sophomore Participates
link   Randy  replied to  Krishna   7 years ago

what are we going to do to some of the mentally challenged folks here

I am mentally challenged. I am on Social Security Disability because of a mental illness. I can not work. My Diagnosis is "Major Depressive Disorder, with Suicidal Features (I tend to try to kill myself with little or no obvious reason (3 times now and I just can't seem to get away with it, which pisses me off!)) and PTSD." I guess that makes me mentally challenged in some ways, but usually only when my meds are unbalanced. Keeping my meds balanced is a constant chore with the the Psychiatric RN that I work with and my Therapist. My last Psychiatrist described it as trying to stand and balance oneself on top of a basketball in the wind and that really is how it feels. My meds have to be constantly changed as my symptoms move back and forth from one to another, mostly out of control.

The best I can hope for is about 3 or 4 months out of the year of real clarity, another 2 or 3 months of pretty/kinda clear and the rest very unpredictable and out of control. When I am out of control I have an 8 foot length of rope in a drawer in the workbench in my garage and I know at least three points on my property that will hold my weight and I have to spend my time struggling to come up with reasons not to get that rope out and use it. Sometimes it is a really, really hard struggle to not do it. I have spent 4 times in a locked psychiatric ward, twice voluntarily and twice against my will and chances are I'll be in one again sometime in the coming year. And then again in the next 2 or 3 years. And on and on. That is my life for the rest of my life. That is my future. That is what I have to look forward to.

I just hope Paul Ryan doesn't cut my Social Security Disability or privatize my Medicare (which I paid into all of my life and pay $118 a month premium on now) because then I will be fucked for good. Then the rope will come out.

So yes, some of us here are mentally challenged and I'll bet I am not the only one.

 
 
 
XXJefferson51
Senior Guide
link   seeder  XXJefferson51  replied to  Randy   7 years ago

It seems that you are having a rough go of things.  There is a higher power out there willing to provide help, aid, and comfort for all problems known to mankind if only we seek it out.  

 
 
 
Randy
Sophomore Participates
link   Randy  replied to  XXJefferson51   7 years ago

The only reason I posted that was to let some people know that it is not always all about "some people" in a Bill that is being debated somewhere or where you come down ideologically on an issue. On if you are Democrat or Republican. That when people like Ryan talk about putting people on Medicare on a voucher system that it's not just a number, but that they are real people, as I am. That it is not about him just not liking what he calls "entitlements" (which they are not, they are payback and continued premiums) and his wanting to get rid of them for purely ideological reasons because he just plain opposes the program period and for no other reason. That he and those who rise up and say "I agree" forget that saying so deeply affects a great many real human beings. That these are real people. That thy are not just numbers on a ledger. If he goes to his grave thinking that the greatest accomplishment in his life is that he managed to get rid of Medicare or Social Security then he had better pray that I am right about there being no God, because if there is he will roast in hell for his heartlessness.

 
 
 
XXJefferson51
Senior Guide
link   seeder  XXJefferson51  replied to  Randy   7 years ago

They are not cutting social security or Medicare. 

 
 
 
Randy
Sophomore Participates
link   Randy  replied to  XXJefferson51   7 years ago

Paul Ryan's goal is to privatize them. Starting with vouchers for Medicare which you can be certain will not be enough to pay for the level of care Medicare gives me and which I paid for and still pay for every month.

 
 

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