The Democrats 'indispensable duty of self-love'...

Some great Alexander Hamilton quotes from a recent editorial courtesy of the NY Sun:

(hat-tip to Michelle from today's Vent)

... Congressmen and their aides are allegedly playing politics. Playing politics is what congressmen and their aides are supposed to do. When they start doing so with sensitive intelligence, however, Americans are going to notice that they risk jeopardizing national security. This concern is as old as the republic. In Federalist No. 70, Alexander Hamilton justified creation of a single executive in part with these words: "Decision, activity, secrecy, and despatch will generally characterize the proceedings of one man in a much more eminent degree than the proceedings of any greater number; and in proportion as the number is increased, these qualities will be diminished."

The Founders recognized that secrecy and fast action in respect of foreign and security policy can be vital to the national interest, which is why they vested such powers in the president. That point has been too often lost during President Bush's attempt to prosecute the war on terror. Despite the administration's briefings of key lawmakers, including Ms. Harman, on programs like the warrantless terrorist surveillance operation, Democrats have called for even more "cooperation" with Congress. It's now beginning to look like such secrets aren't necessarily safe even with the intelligence committee. Democrats' caterwauling about Mr. Bush's alleged obsession with imperious secrecy will ring hollow until they come clean about their own willingness — and ability — to keep important state secrets.

Ms. Harman is a relatively strong player among the Democrats, but Hamilton, as always, understood the phenomenon that we are witnessing today in the broadest sense. Federalist 70, which was issued in the Packet and addressed to the People of New York, was about the idea of a vigorous executive branch. And in it he put his finger — or pen — on exactly the nature of the fault of the Democrats today. "Men often oppose a thing," he wrote, "merely because they have had no agency in planning it, or because it may have been planned by those whom they dislike. But if they have been consulted, and have happened to disapprove, opposition then becomes, in their estimation, an indispensable duty of self-love."

An interesting note and tie-in to an update on a recent post... on the NY Posts increasing readership:

The New York Post, founded by Alexander Hamilton on November 16, 1801, is the oldest continuously published daily newspaper in the United States.

Cool.