Joke?: CPAC to Award Donald Rumsfeld a "Defender of the Constitution" Award

CPAC is about to make a major mistake as it kicks off. This weekend they will award Donald Rumsfeld a "Defender of the Constitution" Award. Rumsfeld, in my honest opinion symbolizes the further shift of American foreign policy, policy that I wouldn't exactly call Constitutional. His record goes much further back with questionable use of federal power.

For you have to remember it was Rumsfeld who was hired by Searle for his connections in the federal government. For years, Searle spent millions working to push Nutra Sweet (aspartame) through the FDA as test after test warned of neurological damage of the artificial sweetener. It was upon Rumsfeld taking the position at Searle that aspartame finally won approval in the FDA despite evidence of its dangers.

Let's look at Rumsfeld as Secretary of Defense. Yes, we were attacked on 9/11, however the American people were led down a slippery slope into a war that clearly officially turned America from a crumbling republic to an unconstitutional imperial state. Even in 2011, with Obama promising we will soon leave Iraq, 14 new strategic bases are being forced upon the sovereign Iraqi people by the United States government. This isn't very Constitutional. Our federal government is to provide for common defense--not common offense, which Rumsfeld oversaw as we launched a never-ending war and expanded military bases in Iraq (which now appears to be more for oil than WMDs like Rumsfeld led the American people to believe). We are never pulling out of Iraq, even though our national debt continues to increase rapidly due to the costs of occupation.

The moral and constitutional obligations of our representatives in Washington are to protect our liberty, not coddle the world, precipitating no-win wars, while bringing bankruptcy and economic turmoil to our people.
~Ron Paul

Rumsfeld also doesn't have the best record on the Second Amendment. Under his chain of command of the Army, which is he was second only second to President George W. Bush, federal troops in New Orleans began working with police and National Guard to confiscate fire arms after Hurricane Katrina. Does this sound like a defender of the Constitution to you?

Rumsfeld was also part of the Bush 43 neocon administration. If you believe Bush and his cronies were friends to the Constitution, remember this. It was Bush's cabinet, which included Rumsfeld, who were instrumental in the passage and implementation of the Patriot Act. We now know the great crimes against the Fourth Amendment now caused by the Patriot Act, including the TSA groping your genitals, the Department of Homeland Security defining common Americans as terrorists, naked body scanners, cell phone tracking, and Z Backscatter x-ray vans.

If this is the best CPAC can do to award a Defender of the Constitution award to, then we have real problems in the United States.