If only Sen. Mike Lee and his communications director, Conn Carroll, would heed Carroll’s snarky advice admonishing George Pyle in his Public Forum letter of Dec. 8, “Recognize the principles of the Constitution.”
Carroll is obviously ignorant of his delicious irony when he writes that it is "difficult to escape our short-term prisms … [on] the principles that organize our republic."
Mr. Carroll, where is the senator's insistence that Article I, Section 9, Paragraph 8 (the Emoluments Clause) be enforced? There are numerous instances of this sitting president and his family benefiting from his decisions as head of state. The senator's eloquent silence suggests his insistence on constitutional principles comes after party loyalty.
Mr. Carroll, where was the senator's voice raised in opposition to the Senate's refusal to provide President Obama's most capable Supreme Court nominee, Merrick Garland, an honest confirmation hearing? The Senate has the constitutional obligation to advise and consent. There is no constitutional empowerment to refuse to meet Garland unless, of course, the senator's first loyalty is to his party playing politics and not to the duties imposed by this republic's Constitution.
Mr. Carroll, if the free press is really one of the “cornerstones of our country,” where is the senator's outrage at the killing of a U.S. resident /Saudi journalist, Jamal Khashoggi? The senator's silence is deafening.
If patriotism is, as Dr. Johnson opined, "the last refuge of the scoundrel,” then surely Lee's wrapping himself in only those parts of our Constitution that fit his political agenda is a close second.
Gordon LaFleur, Murray
