Schadenfreude
Here's a pretty old legacy post from the blog archives of Geekery Today; it was written about 20 years ago, in 2004, on the World Wide Web.
Whether he’s making sense or not, Alan Keyes does not photograph well.
I honestly have no idea whatsoever who will come out ahead in the elections this upcoming November. (I think Kerry has a lot going for him but also seems to be showing some of the Democrats’ pluck at pulling defeat from the jaws of victory.) But however things may look, here is one happy little note to remember as this election season progresses:
No matter how things go in November, Alan Keyes is almost certain to lose.
And that, my friends, is something to celebrate. Mazel tov!
Further reading:
- Alas, A Blog 2004/08/15: Keyes proposes slave reparations (kinda)
- GT 2003/11/15: Theocracy No Moore discusses Alan Keyes’ odd argument in defense of Roy Moore
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Bah, is Alan Keyes any worse than the conventional-demokratik opponent he is running against? Answer: no.
Well. I suppose that whether you find Alan Keyes to be substantially worse than Barack Obama or not depends on how you feel about, say, the use of a federal constitutional amendment to enact a government prohibition of abortion; or, say, established churches and theocracy at the state level (based on the notion that people have a “right” to live in a “community” in which they can assault other people in the community who don’t share their religious views); or the astonishing theory that the State can assault people for choosing to commit suicide because of their inalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. All of these are pet projects of Keyes’ that border, at times, on obsession. Make no mistake: for all the talk of “federalism” and “limited government” and “political liberty”, Alan Keyes wants more government, all the time, everywhere, with the primary purpose of making us more virtuous (as he understands that term) people. The only principled objections he has to invasions on the individual rights of citizens are ones of the distribution of invasions: he believes that state governments should be the ones pointing the gun to your head, not the federal government.
(Except, of course, for abortion. There, of course, we need to call in the feds.)
And the run-of-the-mill Democratic (not to mention run-of-the-mill Republican) politicians, such as Obama, are also terrible.
I have a gut-level affection for Keyes because I like the sound of his voice and because he seems to get excited about freedom and capitalism sometimes — despite the fact that this contradicts other of his proposals. In purely practical terms, both sides want to do bad things, and lots of them, so it seems like 6 of one vs. a half dozen of the other.