TIERS OF FAIRNESS

The American concept of fairness is as embedded in our collective psyche as is freedom.  In fact, a case can be made for the two essentially meaning the same thing.  Yet, like all that is endowed to us by our Creator, if we are to enjoy the right to fairness, we must protect it as tenaciously as we would our freedom, for the two are symbiotically related.  Which brings us to the nasty issue of Attorney General Eric Holder’s contempt for Congress resulting in that body holding him in the same regard…legally.  And therein is the rub.  We live under a system of two-tiered fairness.

Put as simply as it should be, if you and I were held in contempt of Congress, there would be gigantic consequences, hard consequences, bad consequences, the kind of consequences that would drain our fortunes and spirits, however meager or ample they may be.  Fear of those consequences would compel us to avoid being held in contempt of Congress at all costs.  More to the point, if Congress voted to hold you or me in contempt for refusing to submit documents it has every right to see, we would be fully prosecuted.  Just so, if you and I lied to a grand jury, as did President Clinton, we would be criminally prosecuted for perjury.  Had we done to Monica Lewinsky what he did, we could have conceivably been brought up on sexual harassment charges and presumably convicted given the evidence.

Though we are all created equal, most people know life is not fair, but must the system of government under which we live create de facto tiers of fairness such that we are certainly not all equal under our laws?  Those of us not of the “political” class must face the full force and fury of the law at all times, but those of the political class don’t, unless they’re on the losing side of elections, but even then they escape the consequences since in the political class losing an election is tantamount to losing one’s life.  The winning side figures that is sufficient punishment.  Were we of the people class so fortunate.

Let us suppose for a moment that Eric Holder is indeed trying to hide or cover up involvement in the present gunrunning scandal.  Let us also assume that there are documents which clearly reveal the intent of “Fast and Furious” was to in effect subvert the Second Amendment by showing how guns sold in America ended up in the hands of Mexican murderers thus creating an outrage in the media if nowhere else.  Then let us go one step beyond to the point where some of what Holder is hiding leads directly to Barack Obama, his fingerprints all over the design if not the execution of the program.  Now fast forward to November 6, 2012.  Romney beats Obama.  What happens to everyone involved in Fast and Furious?

Conventional wisdom suggests there would be no stomach for prosecuting an ex-Attorney General much less an ex-President.  In a show of “statesmanship” a President Romney may make the announcement that in order to “heal the country’s wounds,” “bridge the divide,” “bring us together,” and all the other tired platitudes from pre-racial America, he will not seek prosecution of any Obama era individuals.  Would any one of us enjoy the same fate?

Like fairness, the word justice has been so perverted that it has no real meaning in contemporary America.  Minorities want “social justice,” but what they should really want is simple, plain old fairness from their own government, not in terms of welfare, but in terms of being equal under the law…all of us, no exceptions.

The Fourteenth Amendment should be rewritten if not repealed and replaced with another.  The new wording would go something like this, “No [State] Jurisdiction, be it federal, state or local shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.  All persons being equal under the law, no person, regardless of political position shall escape the rule of law or the prosecution thereof for any crime committed while holding office, nor will any statute limiting such prosecution be enacted.”

Imagine if Obama, Holder & Company, or any other politician, knew beyond doubt that he or she could and would be prosecuted for any crime they committed while in office even twenty years down the road.  Not only would history be their judge, but the very system which so inexorably judges us would be judging them as well.  That might go a ways to satisfying our American desire for fairness for all, it would certainly make people like Holder and Obama think twice before ignoring the Constitution or breaking the law in general.

We are not a people, not a nation, nothing without basic fairness as the backbone of our society.  We grew up knowing this, it may be an innate sense.  Why then are we not demanding that we all must face the same consequences, especially those who impose on us the laws which when violated result in them?  The political class must be brought to heel, the tier of fairness they are on brought down.  When a tiny minority can make the laws, but not be subject to them, it is a disease requiring the prescription of outright revolution to cure.