INSen Archive

PRESS RELEASE: Gay…Marriage? Is THAT what we think this is about?

Andrew Horning, Candidate for Indiana US Senate

May 15, 2012

Freedom, IN: Like all things political, the “gay marriage” issue has become far more battle cry and “litmus test” than sane discussion.

What we call gay marriage is not (I repeat, NOT) about a church recognized covenant between a man, a woman, and God.  No, the church gave that unto Caesar a long time ago.  That’s why the minister says, “…by the power vested in me by the State of…”

Marriage, my fellow Americans, is politics.

Now, marriage is about Social Security, bereavement pay, visitation rights, property rights, work rules, tax rules, and more rules, rules rules from the Great Caesar’s Golden Calf.  Marriage is legal, contractual, corporate, political privilege, rights, guardianship and healthcare.

So, those who now want to claim the moral high ground on traditional marriage have wallowed into the preposterous role of promoting disparity in matters of simple justice.

I propose we get politics entirely out of marriage.  From the Christian perspective, we should take from Caesar what is God’s. From the secular perspective, we should make policy and law that does not involve sorting, allocating and denying rights based upon abstract and arbitrary political categories.

Not only is this the moral thing to do, it is also the Law of the Land.  Our constitutions were written in large part to prevent politicians from granting “to any citizen, or class of citizens, privileges or immunities, which, upon the same terms, shall not equally belong to all citizens.” (Indiana Constitution Article I Section 23)

That is what I’m putting on the ballot – rules that are few enough to know, simple enough to understand, and important enough that they’re to apply equally…to all.

This is all written down in the annotated Indiana and US Constitutions at http://horningforsenate.com.  These precious, workable laws will be on the US Senate ballot exclusively under the name, Andrew Horning (L).

(Andrew Horning is a candidate for the 2012 LPIN US Senate nomination.)

FREEDOM, IN – There’s been some noise about this year’s National Defense Authorization Act. The December 5 Forbes.com published the ominous-sounding article, “The National Defense Authorization Act is the Greatest Threat to Civil Liberties Americans Face.”

Oh hogwash. The Act is just a bunch of words. Granted, a big bunch of words at 926 pages for S.1867 alone – that’s many, many times the number of words in the entire constitution as amended…plus the Declaration of Independence…plus some historical commentary…plus my local phone book. It’s another 908 pages for H.R. 1540.

These words are not law. These words are, in fact, illegal. Null and void at best, the Act is clearly unconstitutional:

The United States of America hasn’t constitutionally declared a war since WWII, so the authorization bill, an annual crime for the past 48 years, could constitutionally authorize only the maintenance of navies (we’ve never amended the constitution to allow for the maintenance of anything else outside state militias).

The Act could be legal only as far as the limits of the US Constitution’s authority grant (see Amendment 10 for clarification on this).

Americans do face threats to their civil liberties, but only those they’ve voted for themselves. We can at any time choose to leash our unrestrained politicians; I’m running on that hope, in fact. I aim to govern our government to what’s clearly written for all to read.

It’s all here (http://lpin.org/files/2011/12/THE-UNITED-STATES-CONSTITUTION-1211.pdf); we only need to choose it. It will be on the ballot for 2012 under the name, Andrew Horning (L).

(This is a press release from Horning’s campaign. Reposting on LPIN.org does not reflect an endorsement of his candidacy by the LPIN SCC. Candidates for the LPIN nomination are selected at the LPIN convention in March of 2012.)

(Andrew Horning is a candidate for the LPIN’s 2012 US Senate Nomination. View his website here.)

That’s the question I hear the most: “What are you going to do for me?”  But let me ask you; what have politicians done for you so far?

In his 1961 inaugural address, JFK ordered an about-face from the New Deal when he said, “…ask not what your country can do for you–ask what you can do for your country.”  He then pushed for the biggest tax cut in history.  The great orator, abolitionist, statesman and former slave Frederick Douglass said, “Do nothing with us, or by us, as a particular class.  We now simply ask to be allowed to do for ourselves.”  Our “Founding Fathers” created a nation that had the simplest, thriftiest, most minimal government on earth, and this nation flourished like no other in history.  Why did people ask less and get more back then?  Why are we failing now?  It’s simple.  The people who win power with promises are not the ones who help you every day.

Politicians don’t make the discoveries that make our lives safer, longer, and more comfortable.  Free-market, free-thinking artisans, inventors, scientists and entrepreneurs do that.  Government doesn’t build cars, nice houses and stylish shoes.  It doesn’t make espresso, or bicycle helmets, or leather sofas, or medicines.  It doesn’t make jumbo jets, computers or portable DVD players.  Private businesses are launching spacecraft and building global telecom systems.  Doctors can, without political intervention, open up a failing human body, replace the heart, and allow a life to go on.

Yet we’ve somehow convinced ourselves that without government, there’d be no roads.  Some of us think that without government subsidies, there’d be no football, no art, no charity, no business.  While we don’t utter it anymore, there is a name for this thinking.  We used to call it socialism, and Americans used to fight it.  Now we whimper and beg for it; and we’re getting it good and hard.

So, you want to know what I’ll do for you?

Perhaps you call it “Spring Cleaning” when you look around, get disgusted with what you see, and purge your environment of anything that doesn’t suit you.  It’s called good business when companies consolidate, drop ancillary operations and focus on core business.  Whatever you call it, I will apply this wisdom to government again.  It’s worked every time we’ve tried it, and it works to the benefit of all.  That sounds like a fair deal to me.