The political expression of, and protection of, individual Free Will, which our society is then moved and formed by. Far too little is said of that astounding concept.
And it is trampled, in public, by the very structure of a caucus. I did not go to the St. Charles 'Raucus Caucus', because I have no intention of standing up for whichever politician I manage to convince myself that I dislike least, which of course has the adverse affect of strengthening the position of those I like even less.
A caucus is a way of manipulating the actions of voters to reflect the will of those who are best at manipulation. And this post on the Jefferson County Tea Party site, by someone going by the moniker of WrongOnRed, "Central Committee Hijack- Contrary Caucus View" gives an excellent description of similar goings on in the Jefferson County caucus, and videos as well, of people engaged in, with the best of intentions, I'm sure, of manipulating political power to impose their will, unseen (they hoped) upon their fellows - for the greater good, no doubt.
But even better than the political blow-by-blow, he goes deeper towards the true issues involved, including this passage,
I say all this to lay a foundation for what I am about to say. I have always been intrigued and drawn to the concept of “Free Will” in Christian Scholarship and Theology, but only in the last 2 years, have I come to realize and internalize that “Free Will” of which St. Thomas wrote and “Liberty” of which Dr. Paul writes and speaks are actually the same thing."Leaving aside the Ron Paul issue for the moment, Free Will is more than liberty, liberty is the political condition that is conducive to exercising your Free Will, without impeding others from doing the same. But Free Will is much more than that, Free Will is the seat of You in life, it is how you are able to live as a human being, human life, rationality, reason, love, morality, Right & Wrong, would vanish without Free Will - or the ability to exercise it.
We perceive reality, we see what is and in so doing we have our first choice to make - to acknowledge and respect reality, conforming our will to what is true 'Nature to be commanded must be obeyed'; or to deny it, choosing to attempt to impose our will upon it, freely choosing to lie to ourselves and everyone else. Every child at some point chooses to use the magical power of words to lie about reality in order to get what they want, some never learn how harmful that is, to choose to pursue Power instead of Truth.
Every person in exercising their Free Will has a central choice to make, whether to choose based upon reality and truth, or upon what we wish were true. The first is the path of truth, virtue, morality, and that is the path upon which you can choose to pursue happiness.
The other choice is to reject reality where it conflicts with what you wish it were, in order to make your will more real than reality, that is the path of power and it knows and can know nothing of truth, virtue or morality, and it pursues nothing, it is in perpetual flight from reality, and it will never, ever, know happiness.
A life where you were not free to exercise your Free Will, would be inhuman. Those points in your life where you must make a decision, nearly every second (pay attention some time, count 'em), are those moments where your life is you in action - you are never as much actively in your life as at those moments when you choose, and what follows from your choices is a life created by you - one worth living because by your nature you created it.
When someone prevents you from making your own choices for your own life, they do much more than perhaps violate laws, they forcibly remove you from those points in your life where life is lived, and insert themselves in your place in your own life - they are hijacking your life... forcing you into the passenger seat of your own life, bound & gagged, unable to steer your own course, no longer free to live your own life, staring out the windows with no idea or clue as to where you are going.
There's an evil there that makes zombie movies look cute.
A 'human being' without Free Will, would be nothing but a robot bouncing off of obstacles in a pin ball machine. The secret to the Left is that, beginning with Rousseau, that is what they believe, that you do not have Free Will, that your actions are not chosen by you within your life, but are necessarily determined by outside events. In modern philosophy, which is to say Leftism, you simply react to outside events, and 'happiness' is nothing more than a pleasing arrangement of bumpers and with flippers padded to make the least jarring impact to the robots zooming around within the game. The entire purpose of the Leftist State is to replace those moments where you would exercise your Free Will, with their state imposed bumpers and flippers, directing your life from without.
Tilt.
But there is a danger in exercising your Free Will that no one ever escapes, left, right or center, the left simply is more explicitly in favor of it than the rest, and that is separating yourself from reality by saying that 'the ends justify the means', that it is OK to exert your power over others, because in the end, it'll all work out for the best.
If you read or watched The Lord of the Rings, Sauron's ring, the Ring of Power, doesn't force itself upon people, it lures them, lures them with promises of being able to bring about the Good they seek to do, what they know would be best for all concerned. Gandalf and Galadriel see the temptation and turn away from it, knowing that True power comes from making choices, not imposing them... Boromir didn't, and he sucummed to it, even though he never wore Sauron's One Ring.
What "WrongOnRed" didn't mention, in his support of the Ron Paul people, is that they did the very same thing, he is so upset that Bryan Spencer did, as this from Brent Stafford, the person at the center of the St. Charles fiasco, makes clear:
Let me digress a moment. We had prepared very well ahead of time. I won't get into all of the details, but the Mitt Romney people agreed to support me for Chairman. This was an incredible vote of confidence in my ability to chair and to convene a fair process. I had also hire the President of the Missouri Association of Parliamentarians who I intended to appoint for that role. I never got that chance.
Eugene Dokes appointed the Creditials Committee, Rules Committee, and Parliamentarian. These are all appointments made by the elected Chairman, not the temporary Chair which is what Eugene Dokes was acting as. The body loudly booed and started making all kinds of points of order and other declarations of disgust at the blatant disregard for the proper process."
Power. It always looks good to those who seek it 'for the best of intentions'.
There are two videos in the post which show people, doubtlessly good, well intentioned people, seeking power over others, with the best of intentions.
Tilt.
