Alex Peak


Barr’s testimony before House Judiciary Committee

In Constitutional Rights, Libertarian, Libertarian Party-US on July 26, 2008 at 1:42 am

The 14-page written testimony by Libertarian presidential nominee Bob Barr before the Friday House Judiciary Committee hearing on Executive Power and Its Constitutional Limitations is available here as a PDF. Testimony of others can be found here.

  2. Fascinating. Barr seems to have as much or more of an indictment against Congress as against Bush – which is entirely appropriate, I beleive.

    The most important requirement is that Congress treat seriously its responsibility to uphold the Constitution. Neither the Bill of Rights nor the separation of powers are self-enforcing documents or principles. The legislative branch has a critical role to play.

    Susan Hogarth 26 July 2008 at 2am

  3. Barr gives a good overview of the many things done by the Bush government in making war against the American people.

    He does not, however, convince me that he wasn’t right there, from the beginning of the Bush administration, cheering them on, and voting for their measures when he was in Congress. I understand that Barr and Viguerie have an American freedom agenda. I just don’t accept that they are the proper champions for such a thing, given their roles in bringing about the tyranny under which we suffer.

    Jim Davidson 26 July 2008 at 2am

  4. We live in a country where, even with the broadest, most fungible definition of the term, maybe 20% of the electorate could be called libertarian. If you went with the radical definition, more like 0.5%. Either way, the point is that any minority movement aspiring to become a majority HAS to be willing to accept “converts”, for lack of a better term. The only way we’ll ever fix this mess is by making libertarians of people who currently support it- which is exactly what has happened with Barr. That’s kind of hard to do when so many Libertarians seem more interested in angrily denouncing every one else than reaching out to work with them.

    AC 27 July 2008 at 12am

  5. I understand that Barr and Viguerie have an American freedom agenda. I just don’t accept that they are the proper champions for such a thing

    The question I have is whether we’re at a point where we have the luxury of months or years to argue about legitimacy of recent converts, or whether we’re at the point where the predation is so serious that we should accept whatever help we can get to help roll it back.

    Personally, I’m in the latter category.

    Brian Miller 27 July 2008 at 1pm

  6. Susan: exactly, congress is also polling much lower than even Bush, in single digits. Problem is majority of congress members on both sides are bought and paid for by AIPAC. Ron Paul remarked a few years ago that even Jesse Helms – who has endorsed Dr. Paul’s book on the gold standard – has been succumbing under the same influence. There is another Jewish PAC – J street – now, but they won’t be so influential and simply “AIPAC lite”. Any criticism of AIPAC gets you labelled as “antisemitic”. Murray Sabrin should have been a candidate for congress, and not senate, and would probably have won this way and would be an invaluable aid to Ron Paul in congress. The only solution is to elect a whole set of new congressmen/women in 2010, and also in the senate IMHO…

    Stefan 28 July 2008 at 9am

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