A republic, not a democracy
By Patrick J. Buchanan

March 2, 2005

As Herr Schroeder was babbling on in Mainz, during his joint press conference with President Bush, about a need for carrots to coax Tehran off its nuclear program, Bush interrupted the chancellor to issue yet another demand – that "the Iranian government listen to the hopes and aspirations of the Iranian people."

"We believe," said Bush, "that the voice of the people ought to be determining policy, because we believe in democracy ..."

Who, one wonders, is feeding the president his talking points?

Is he unaware that the Iranian people, even opponents of the regime, believe Iran has a right to nuclear power and should retain the capacity to build nuclear weapons? Tehran's decision to stop enriching uranium, to appease E.U. negotiators, was not at all popular.

While 70 percent of Iranians may have voted to dump the mullahs, just as Pakistanis were delirious with joy when they exploded their first nuclear device, we should expect Iranians to react the same way. What people have not celebrated when the nation has joined the exclusive nuclear club?

"We believe ... that the voice of the people ought to be determining policy," said Bush, "because we believe in democracy."

But does Bush really believe this? How does the president think the Arab peoples would vote on the following questions: 1) Should the United States get out of Iraq? 2) Is it fair to compare Israel's treatment of Palestinians to Nazi treatment of the Jews? 3) Do Arab nations have the same right to an atom bomb as Ariel Sharon? 4) Is Osama bin Laden a terrorist or hero?

If Bush believes he and we are popular in the Islamic world, why has he not scheduled a grand tour of Rabat, Cairo, Beirut, Amman, Riyadh and Islamabad to rally the masses to America's side, rather than preach democracy at them from the White House? If one-man, one-vote democracy came suddenly to the Arab world, every pro-American ruler in the region would be at risk of being swept away.

Yet, there is a larger issue here than misreading the Arab mind. Whence comes this democracy-worship, this belief by President Bush that "the voice of the people ought to be determining policy"?

Would Bush himself let a poll of Americans decide how long we keep troops in Iraq? Would he submit his immigration policy to popular vote?

"We often hear the claim that our nation is a democracy," writes columnist Dr. Walter Williams. But, "That wasn't the vision of the founders. They saw democracy as another form of tyranny ... The founders intended, and laid out the ground rules for, our nation to be a republic ... The word 'democracy' appears nowhere in the Declaration of Independence or the Constitution."

Indeed, the Constitution guarantees "to every State in this Union a Republican form of government."

Asks Williams: "Does our pledge of allegiance to the flag say to 'the democracy for which it stands,' or does it say to 'the republic for which it stands'? Or do we sing 'The Battle Hymn of the Democracy' or 'The Battle Hymn of the Republic'?"

There is a critical difference between a republic and a democracy, Williams notes, citing our second president:

John Adams captured the essence of that difference when he said: "You have rights antecedent to all earthly governments; rights that cannot be repealed or restrained by human laws; rights derived from the Great Legislator of the Universe." Nothing in our Constitution suggests that government is a grantor of rights. Instead, government is a protector of rights.

The founders deeply distrusted democracy. Williams cites Adams again: "Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts and murders itself. There was never a democracy yet that did not commit suicide." Chief Justice John Marshall seconded Adams' motion: "Between a balanced republic and a democracy, the difference is like that between order and chaos."

"When the Constitution was framed," wrote historian Charles Beard, "no respectable person called himself or herself a democrat."

Democracy-worship suggests a childlike belief in the wisdom and goodness of "the people." But the people supported the guillotine in the French Revolution and Napoleon. The people were wild with joy as the British, French and German boys marched off in August 1914 to the Great War that inflicted the mortal wound on Western Civilization. The people supported Hitler and the Nuremburg Laws.

Our fathers no more trusted in the people always to do the right thing than they trusted in kings. In the republic they created, the House of Representatives, the people's house, was severely restricted in its powers by a Bill of Rights and checked by a Senate whose members were to be chosen by the states, by a president with veto power and by a Supreme Court.

"What kind of government do we have?" the lady asked Benjamin Franklin, as he emerged from the Constitutional Convention.

Said Franklin, "A republic – if you can keep it."

Let us restore that republic and, as Jefferson said, "Hear no more of trust in men, but rather bind them down from mischief with the chains of the Constitution."

Talk about your Fahrenheit 451...

From an excellent interview at NYYFans.com with Peter Golenbock, about the writing of his fabulous oral history of the Yankees, Dynasty. With all due respect to Frank Costanza, this was much worse than trading Jay Buhner. Every time I think about this I get sick.

PETER GOLENBOCK :...I went to Yankee Stadium and I spent the next year becoming a member of the Yankee family. I did my research. They had a huge archive—which, by the way, Steinbrenner threw in the garbage when took over. He just threw it all out when they moved to Queens.

PHIL ALLARD: Steinbrenner did WHAT??? So somebody that wanted to go back now and retrace your steps couldn’t do it.

PETER GOLENBOCK: Nope, Couldn’t do it.

PHIL ALLARD: That’s a tragedy. That’s the library at Alexandria burning.

PETER GOLENBOCK: Yep.

From Charlotte.com
Mon, Feb. 28, 2005

Sunday will be time to celebrate Tobacco Road
By Ron Green, Sr.

As they have done with firm jaw and fiery eye over the past 85 years, North Carolina and Duke will face each other on the basketball court Sunday, this time in Chapel Hill. And as they have done with steely resolve and gritted tooth over the past 95 years, N.C. State and Wake Forest will clash on that same day, this time in Raleigh.

All those games, all those years, thousands of players, dozens of coaches, millions of memories, and it never gets old. For two hours Sunday, they will be, for their faithful, the Games of the Year, superceding the other Games of the Year played this season and those yet to come.

It's Big Four basketball. There's nothing like it in America, and don't say there is if you don't want to get your ears scalded. North Carolinians have been raised on barbecue, grits and Big Four basketball -- with a little stock-car racing on the side. It's family. It's what warms the winter nights, what we talk about over the morning coffee, what makes us paint our faces, take off our shirts and act the fool. Raise a querying eyebrow at the Grand Quadrumvirate? No sir, a quadrillion times no. In fact, quadruple that.

Where else can you drive roughly 100 miles in about 1 hour, 45 minutes -- from Winston-Salem to Chapel Hill to Durham -- and find three of the top 10 teams in America this season, three who at one time were in the top five? Add another two dozen miles or so and a half hour or so from Durham to Raleigh and you've driven from tip to tip of what is affectionately known as Tobacco Road, home to 32 Final Four teams, nine NCAA champions and almost all of the ACC regular-season and tournament championships.

Home to Dean Smith, Mike Krzyzewski, Everett Case, Norm Sloan, Vic Bubas, Frank McGuire, Michael Jordan, David Thompson, Christian Laettner, Tim Duncan, the Cameron Crazies, the theatrics of Bones McKinney, Jim Valvano exhorting us to never give up, the great misshapen old Reynolds Coliseum, students who camp out for days to get tickets, who traditionally burn campus benches after a big victory, who traditionally roll the campus with toilet paper after a major win, students -- and others -- who cry when they lose the big one.

It's where North Carolina and Duke are so close together, the daughters of Krzyzewski and Smith, the two top coaches in America, at one time took piano lessons from the same woman.

Call up any year and dust it off and the glory will gleam. Case's early teams at N.C. State set the stage for the greatness that followed. North Carolina undefeated in 1956-57. Duke's seven Final Fours in one nine-year stretch. N.C. State's victory over UCLA's perennial champion Bruins en route to the NCAA title. The Valvano Wolfpack and its improbable run to the championship.

The Big Four, where No. 1-ranked intruders go to die. Where there has been a parade of All-Americans, national players of the year, No. 1 NBA draft choices and a constant presence in the national rankings.

Over the years, Big Four teams have beaten, among others, Wilt Chamberlain, Oscar Robertson, Magic Johnson, Hakeem Olajuwon, Ralph Sampson, Len Elmore, Larry Johnson, Alonzo Mourning, Chris Webber and Shaquille O'Neal, as well as, in family feuds, the above-mentioned Jordan, Laettner, Duncan and Thompson.

This season, N.C. State is the only one who needs wins to make it into the NCAA tournament.

There's a chance Wake Forest, North Carolina or Duke could claim top seeds. They won't need all that incentive.

As Maryland coach Gary Williams said recently, "That's a tough neighborhood down there."

The toughest.

Ron Green Sr. is a retired Observer sports columnist. Reach him at greensr@charlotteobserver.com.