Thursday, December 30, 2010

The Stupidity of Ezra Klein

I avoid writing of politics, religion, and weather. On such matters, I have no unique experience or perspective to share. Furthermore, I have no desire to alienate anybody who shares my desire to reduce our rate of wrongful conviction and imprisonment. So when I hear people say seemingly stupid things about politics, religion, or weather, I don't write about them.

For Ezra Klein, however, I'll make an exception.

Appearing on MSNBC as their policy wonk, Washington Post blogger Ezra Klein wants the world to know two things about the U.S. Constitution.
One is that it has no binding power on anything, and that two the issue is not that people don't read the text and think they're following it, the issue is that the text is confusing because it was written more than one hundred years ago and what people believe it says differs from person to person and differs depending on what they want to get done.
Ezra doesn't seem to have as much respect for the U.S. Constitution as he does apparently for ... lemme think here ... let's say ... Nazi Germany. That's right. Ezra Klein felt the world should know that the Nazis, while evil, still had some really good ideas. I quote from an Ezra Klein post at The American Prospect.
Not everything the Nazis touched was bad. Hitler was a vegetarian. Volkswagen is a perfectly good car company. Universal health care is a perfectly good idea. Indeed, the Nazis actually did a pretty good job increasing economic growth and improving standards of living (they were, many think, the first Keynesians, adopting the strategy even before Keynes had come up with it), pushing Germany out of a depression and back into expansion. Unfortunately, they also set out to conquer Europe and exterminate the Jews. People shouldn't do that.
One possibility is that Ezra Klein is a clever public figure who promotes himself by saying outrageous things that other lesser beings, such as I, will foolishly write about and thereby spread his fame and increase his fortune. 

Another possibility is that Ezra Klein is a muffin-brained black hole of stupidity who sincerely doesn't know  that the U.S. Constitution does in fact have binding power on all actions of the U.S. government, that elected officials take an oath to defend and uphold the Constitution.

Perhaps another possibility still is that there is some cosmic law mandating conservation of stupidity and Ezra Klein took a massive stupid pill so that twenty other people wouldn't have to be stupid. How else could Ezra be unable to understand such straightforward writing?
The House of Representatives shall be composed of Members chosen every second Year by the People of the several States ...

The Senate of the United States shall be composed of two Senators from each State ...

The executive Power shall be vested in a President of the United States of America. He shall hold his Office during the Term of four Years ...

In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed.

Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.

[T]he right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury, shall be otherwise re-examined in any Court of the United States ...

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.
I would never suggest that anyone, other than Ezra Klein's clones and acolytes, would be unable to understand the clear and unambiguous language of the Constitution. I recognize there is substantial debate about how to observe the Constitutional limitations and implement the Constitutional mandates. That is far from saying, however, that the Constitution "has no binding power on anything."

Rue the day Ezra Klein should ever be right.

This just in: England, a progressive country unimpeded by a Constitution, has decided that the King's subjects can forthwith be tried multiple times for the same crime.

Just in: Venezuela, a progressive country unrestrained in its governmental powers, has granted Hugo Chavez the power to rule by decree.

Just in: Sudan, a progressive country unencumbered by a Bill of Rights, literally whips its women into submission.

ADDENDUM
Satirist Iowahawk executes a brilliant takedown of Ezra Klein without referring to him as a "muffin-brained black hole of stupidity."