Obama and the Oath

It seems that I have been thinking the same thing as Wall Street Journal columnist Steven G. Calabresi this week:

In a Sept. 6, 2001, interview with Chicago Public Radio station WBEZ-FM, Mr. Obama noted that the Supreme Court under Chief Justice Earl Warren “never ventured into the issues of redistribution of wealth and sort of more basic issues of political and economic justice in this society,” and “to that extent as radical as I think people tried to characterize the Warren Court, it wasn’t that radical.”

He also noted that the Court “didn’t break free from the essential constraints that were placed by the Founding Fathers in the Constitution, at least as it has been interpreted.” That is to say, he noted that the U.S. Constitution as written is only a guarantee of negative liberties from government —and not an entitlement to a right to welfare or economic justice.

This raises the question of whether Mr. Obama can in good faith take the presidential oath to “preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution” as he must do if he is to take office. Does Mr. Obama support the Constitution as it is written, or does he support amendments to guarantee welfare? Is his provision of a “tax cut” to millions of Americans who currently pay no taxes merely a foreshadowing of constitutional rights to welfare, health care, Social Security, vacation time and the redistribution of wealth? Perhaps the candidate ought to be asked to answer these questions before the election rather than after.

Barack Obama: Sandwich Sharer

This week, during a verbal attack on John McCain, Barack Obama uttered the following:

“Now, because he knows that his economic theories don’t work, he’s been spending these last few days calling me every name in the book. Lately he’s called me a socialist for wanting to roll back the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans so we can finally give tax relief to the middle class. I don’t know what’s next. By the end of the week he’ll be accusing me of being a secret communist because I shared my toys in kindergarten. I shared my peanut butter and jelly sandwich.”

If you voluntarily share your toys or your sandwich, it’s called charity. It’s what people, who, oh, I don’t know, “cling to their religion” do on a regular basis.

Communism requires forced sharing, which is closer to what Mr. Obama proposing.

But, hey, what do I know? I’m not the one with the law degree…