Guardian of the Republic

by Allen West

  Deneen Borelli wrote about the overt practice of demonizing blacks who don’t toe the progressive line in her book, Blacklash. She provides countless examples of the duplicitous hypocrisy of the Left, always crying racism against those who oppose their agenda and the twenty-first-century economic plantation.

  In 1991, during his nomination hearings, the future Supreme Court justice Clarence Thomas took an unrelenting media beating that he described as “a high-tech lynching for uppity blacks who in any way deign to think for themselves, to do for themselves, to have different ideas, and it is a message that unless you kowtow to an old order, this is what will happen to you. You will be lynched, destroyed, caricatured by a committee of the US Senate rather than hung from a tree.”

  Today the hunt for the black conservative leads to a metaphorical tree, but the end goal is still death—career death. This relentless pursuit comes from the very same political party that gave the black community the Ku Klux Klan, Jim Crow laws, literacy tests, poll taxes, and literal lynching.

  In 2004, during the search for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, syndicated political cartoonist Jeff Danziger depicted then National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice as a barefoot wet nurse. Danziger had Rice speaking like Prissy, Miss Scarlett’s uneducated maid in Gone With the Wind, saying, “I knows all about aluminum tubes! (Correction) I don’t know nuthin’ about aluminum tubes.” Where was the outcry from black leaders? Where were the protests and calls for Danziger to be fired and for all the papers running the cartoon to issue an apology?

  All we heard at the time were crickets. Yet President Obama and the white liberal progressive media cried racism when UN Ambassador Susan Rice was challenged about her claims to the American people that the September 11, 2012, attack in Benghazi was simply a protest about a YouTube video that got out of hand.

  There’s nothing subtle about this, and there’s no doubt the hunt is on. Just ask Harry Alford, Ken Blackwell, Deneen Borelli, Janice Rogers Brown, Herman Cain, Jennifer Carroll, Ben Carson, Ward Connerly, Larry Elder, Michel Faulkner, Niger Innis, Alphonso Jackson, E. W. Jackson, Kevin Jackson, Alan Keyes, Alveda King, Mia Love, Lenny McAllister, Angela McGlowan, Rod Paige, Star Parker, Jesse Lee Peterson, Michael Powell, Tim Scott, K. Carl Smith, Thomas Sowell, Michael Steele, Shelby Steele, Lynn Swann, Tara Wall, J. C. Watts Jr., David Webb, Armstrong Williams, Walter Williams, Crystal Wright, and many others. They will tell you plainly that the attacks, the vitriol, and the disdain with which they must contend are unending. But we shall not be deterred from the fight.

  The Left must destroy black conservatives because it cannot afford to have freethinking, independent-minded black Americans. If we begin to pull away from the dependency society and stand for the fundamental principles that once made us a proud community, the Left loses.

  But when the Left wins, our community loses. The result of such blind loyalty is that many black voters have come to resemble Vladimir Lenin’s “useful idiots.” They make up an electorate that is completely taken for granted, and no one even bothers to listen. Why is it that a tiny special interest group can push gay marriage, but the black community stays mired in record unemployment? How is it that the Hispanic lobby can force an executive order on immigration policy, but the president relaxes the work requirement standards on Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), essentially keeping the dependency class growing? Why isn’t there a strong voice addressing the issue of education in the black community? Why would there be, when one of President Obama’s first actions in 2009 was canceling the Washington, DC, school voucher program while sending his daughters to tony Sidwell Friends School?

  Why don’t the media address these issues?

  Because as Justice Thomas said, the elites want someone who believes as they do—someone who supports progressive socialist policies. Nothing has changed since nearly two hundred years ago, when the Left supported W. E. B. Du Bois against Booker T. Washington.

  The problem for leftists today is that they no longer face individuals who just fade away and stay in the shadows. When I travel across the country, I meet more and more blacks who come up and shake my hand in agreement. A new generation of young black conservatives is emerging. You find them hanging out with Andrew Simon and Richard Ivory at Hip Hop Republican. You see young bright lights springing up on college campuses—people like Nicholas Buford, a sophomore at Valdosta State University, and Langston Bowens, a freshman at Hillsdale College. I’m deeply encouraged by what I am seeing. Just as I believe there’s a conservative resurgence in America in general, so shall it be in the black community.

  The hunt for the black conservative is on, but slowly the hunter is becoming the hunted. In his superb documentary, Fear of a Black Republican, Kevin Williams delivers a spot-on analysis of a movement that is growing. There may not be a wholesale shift in the black community, but if we have enough movement, it will make a difference. The mainstream media have a clear tendency to recruit other blacks to denigrate and demean black conservatives. The mainstream media have sought to disrespect and deny the existence of black conservatism, but they’re losing the battle—and they realize it. Heck, the fact that this book is being published is another counterstrike against the liberal progressive media. I fully expect it to be ignored or mercilessly picked at.

  But as I’ve said, the soul of our souls is conservative. The big lie that has resulted in the twenty-first-century economic plantation will be exposed and defeated, and our community will be restored. Black conservatives are fighting back. Though our numbers may appear small, we have the tenacity of the three hundred Spartans. We are making a stand, and “we shall overcome, someday.”

  PART IV

  THE FUTURE OF THE AMERICAN REPUBLIC

  Chapter 11

  REPUBLIC OR DEMOCRACY

  The death of democracy is not likely to be an assassination by ambush. It will be a slow extinction from apathy, indifference and undernourishment.

  —ROBERT M. HUTCHINS

  Dictators ride to and fro upon tigers which they dare not dismount. And the tigers are getting hungry.

  —SIR WINSTON CHURCHILL

  When I’m in Washington, DC, my normal morning routine is to get up early for a five- to six-mile run from my “Batcave” down to the National Mall and back. The symbols of our constitutional republic in the early morning light are splendid to behold.

  When I get back to my apartment, I flip on the local Christian radio station. Sometimes they’re playing my favorite segment, the one in which schoolkids are reciting the Pledge of Allegiance—“and to the Republic for which it stands.”

  If there is to be a future for our nation, it means understanding America is a republic, not a democracy. The future of the American republic depends first and foremost on ensuring the citizenry and the voting electorate understand the basic framework of this grand experiment. When I’m speaking, I often pose this question: is America a republic or a democracy? Most people say it’s the latter. How strange that schoolchildren can recite the Pledge of Allegiance yet don’t understand what it means.

  The failure of our education system to fully explain our republic isn’t just an elementary, middle, or high school problem. On college campuses there are far too many political science departments following the dogma of Marx rather than Jefferson. Watch those “on the street” segments that Jesse Watters presents on Fox News, where average citizens are asked civics questions. It should send a chill down your spine when you realize how horribly disengaged the American electorate is. But if we were to hit the streets and ask about the latest episode of some reality show, it would be a different story.

  As George Bernard Shaw mused, “Democracy substitutes election by the incompetent many for appointment by the corrupt few.”

  So just to set the record straight, I offer these contrasting definitions of a republic versus a democracy.

  In its purest form, democracy is government of the masses, where authority comes from the direct expression of the crow
d’s will. In its worst expression, pure democracy can devolve into mobocracy, discontent, and anarchy.

  The authority for a republic comes from public officials—I call them servants—elected by the people to represent their interests. In a republic the law is administered in accordance with established principles of justice. From its founding, America was designed to promote statesmanship, reason, liberty, justice, and advancement for its individual citizens. Lately, however, it seems some folks want to rebrand America as a representative democracy.

  But that was never the intent of our Founding Fathers. In the Federalist Papers, Alexander Hamilton warned that “real liberty is never found in despotism or in the extremes of democracy,” and John Adams had an even more dire prediction: “There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide.”

  That’s why I have to laugh when people say we can bring “democracy” to other cultures and countries that don’t understand the basic principles of individual liberty. It’s not enough to “accept democracy” with the understanding that the majority rules and can impose its will, because groups that do not embrace the ideal of individual rights often see democracy as a way to kill off enough of the opposition to become the majority. Then these new regimes hold elections and say, “See, we have democracy, so we are a legitimate political entity.”

  Y’all don’t believe me? Perhaps you’ve forgotten about Hamas in Gaza, Hezbollah in Lebanon, or the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt?

  My greatest fear is that if we don’t pay attention, the loss of individual rights and the establishment of mob rule will happen here in America. In fact, I believe it’s happening already. No one is literally killing the opposition, but character assassination is certainly executed frequently.

  In the 2012 presidential election, Mitt Romney won approximately 75 to 78 percent of all the counties in America, but that didn’t represent enough votes to win the election. Instead, because we’ve herded 51 percent of the population into urban centers representing under 25 percent of American counties, these few counties were enough to hand President Barack Hussein Obama a second term and, in his mind, a “mandate.”

  It may well be that from now on, all presidential election results will come down to a few counties in certain battleground states, while others—the “flyover states”—will be abandoned.

  In that case we’ve come to a point where the president no longer needs to seek the support of a broad spectrum of the nation’s citizens. Instead, to achieve victory, he needs to win over only a select group, centered around urban population centers.

  Key voters’ decisions and election results are no longer based on adherence to constitutional principles but instead on the promise of benefits made to a disengaged segment of the populace.

  Critics may attack this assertion, but even Benjamin Franklin understood “when the people find that they can vote themselves money, that will herald the end of the republic.” And James Madison warned that if government was not “derived from the great body of the society,” it was in danger of being controlled by a “handful of tyrannical nobles.”

  So I ask you, when a presidential election hinges on a few urban centers, are we truly a representative republic? Regardless of the political party or the result, are we presenting meaningful arguments as to who can best govern the republic or are we simply bribing certain demographics in order to reach a magical number?

  In 2013 I came across a fascinating essay titled “From Republic to Democracy; From Democracy to Kleptocracy; From Kleptocracy to Thugocracy,” by former Marine officer Arthur L. McGinley, PhD. In the essay Dr. McGinley examines how the changes in several key policies began the shift from the original intent of the American republic.

  Most noticeably he addresses the Seventeenth Amendment, which changed how we elected US senators. It was the founders’ intent that senators be appointed by each state legislative body so they would be truly beholden to the state. But the Seventeenth Amendment made senatorial elections based on the will of the people. Dr. McGinley writes: “Rather than promoting legislation that strengthened the republic, all legislators now began to court the will of the uninformed masses.”

  I would say this is not just about the uniformed masses but also the uninformed masses. I am reminded of the scene from Gladiator where young Emperor Commodus distracted the people of Rome from their real woes by giving them “panis et circenses,” bread and circuses.

  What do I see as the future for the American republic?

  Well, Winston Churchill said it best: “Americans can be counted on to do the right thing … after they have exhausted all other possibilities.” I believe the future of the American republic is actually strong and bright. I say this not as some blind ideologue but rather as an American statesman who knows his country.

  We have indeed drifted away from our foundation as a republic, but in my travels, I am meeting more people of all ages who are asking about the Constitution. I see a rededication to who we are as a nation. Most encouragingly I see people challenging those who have been elected.

  Yes, I lost a congressional election in 2012, but not once did I pander to voters and say what they wanted to hear. I told them what they needed to hear. Every day when I see my ugly mug in the mirror, I know I never surrendered my honor, integrity, or character for selfish political gain. Never did I target a certain demographic and offer them gold, and target another and offer them silver, and go before yet another and offer them bronze. Whether you agree or not, my message was always consistent.

  As is written in Matthew 16:26, “For what is a man profited if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul?”

  The future of the American republic will be great if we find more men and women who put their country before personal or electoral gain. We will be exceptional as long as we demand the highest standards and accountability from those we elect.

  But that means we must have the knowledge and guts to realize when we’re being duped and to reject the politicized gimmicks. We’ll know what’s what in the next election cycle. I hope you and the rest of the electorate will be tuned in by then, because the republic for which we stand depends on it.

  Chapter 12

  THE DILEMMA FOR THE AMERICAN REPUBLIC

  Independence is the recognition … that no substitute can do your thinking, as no pinch-hitter can live your life.

  —AYN RAND

  As this book draws to a close, I want to capture some thoughts I often share when speaking. The fate of the American republic lies in the hands of her citizens. Our republic cannot survive if we continue to abdicate to others our freedom to choose.

  And it’s not just that we are abdicating the freedom, we’re doing so without a clear understanding of the issues or the unintended consequences of our surrender. While the political scene in America has become deeply polarized along party lines, we’ve lost sight of how our decisions should be made: not based on party, but on principle—and an understanding of the issues.

  Do I believe a third political party could arise in America? Yes.

  However, it wouldn’t be a party in the same vein as the Democrats and Republicans. It would be a party based on principles. Today the Democratic Party has drifted so far to the left it has lost touch with the fundamental values of our constitutional republic. The Democrats have truly embraced modern-day progressive socialism, and I would challenge anyone to show me where that model has ever been successful anywhere in the world. On the other hand, the Republican Party is slowly diluting itself into oblivion as it listens to talking heads saying it can only be successful as “Democrat Lite.” Unsurprisingly, Democrat Lite has not proved to be a winning formula.

  That leaves those of us who understand and support constitutional conservatism and the fundamentals of the American republic out in the cold. There are party establishments on both sides seeking to manipulate the political process to their liking. The so-called “mainstream media” are complicit in the deception of the American people—and conseque
ntly the people have ceased to trust them. (Fortunately the explosion of social media, blogs, and talk radio has made it harder to hide the corruption.)

  The dilemma the American republic faces is this: shall we be an opportunity society or a dependency society?

  As I write this chapter, America is faced with its highest rates of poverty, greatest number of food stamp recipients, largest number of people on Social Security disability, and lowest workforce participation rate. There can be no doubt we are moving away from creating opportunities for our citizens to making them dependent on government for their subsistence. In the past Americans have always chosen an opportunity society over a dependency society. But the social stigma of being dependent on government for subsistence has vanished—heck, these days it’s almost fashionable.

  How did we become a country where we advertise for people to sign up for welfare assistance, even if they live outside our borders? Do we really want to promote the expansion of the state at the expense of our own personal sovereignty and industrialism? Are we ready to give up those freedoms? Thomas Jefferson said it first: “A government big enough to give you everything you want is also big enough to take it away.”

  America’s greatness was not built by an overarching centralized state but through the strength and resilience of its people. But bit by bit we are surrendering to politicians who stand not for our economic freedom but for economic dependence. The Left and its black gatekeepers went absolutely apoplectic some months ago when I used the word enslavement. But you tell me a better description for what social welfare dependence breeds. To me it’s worse than physical enslavement, because it enslaves human spirit. It destroys the will and determination to seek improvement and a better life.