Mandating a Perfect WorldBy Thomas E. BrewtonLiberal-progressives' conception of social justice always requires  the political state forcibly to impose some form of equality.Social justice, in the catechism of the socialist religion, is no  more than an exertion of raw power to force people to conform to what  liberal-progressives believe conditions ought to be.Forced equality was the mode in the world's first socialist political  state, Revolutionary France.  After the 1789 Revolution, France was  reeling under wild swings from monarchy, to attempts at  constitutional government, to the rule of street mobs.  Matters came  to a head with the execution of King Louis XVI in January, 1793.  The  Assembly's Revolutionary Tribunal and the Committee of Public Safety  announced, "It is wholly necessary to establish briefly the despotism  of freedom in order to crush the despotisms of Kings." (quoted in  André Maurois, "A History of France").What "the despotism of freedom" meant was the bloody Reign of  Terror.  The Revolutionary Tribunal, during fourteen months of  continuous sessions, condemned thousands of people to the guillotine  as purported enemies of the Revolution.  Altogether, more than 70,000  French citizens – men, women, children of all ages – were murdered in  the name of Freedom, Equality and Brotherhood.Today's most common expression of social justice, espoused by Senator  Obama and his socialistic minions, is redistribution of income to  force a society in which, regardless of effort or merit, everyone has  as nearly the same income as possible.Senator Obama's route to that version of social justice is higher  taxes on the upper end of income producers (who already pay almost  70% of all Federal income taxes), and "lower taxes" on the poor.  To  say the least, this is a blatant subterfuge, because the bottom half  of all tax payers pay less than 5% of all income taxes (the bottom  third pay no income taxes at all), making it difficult to lower their  taxes.  In fact, Senator Obama proposes simply to give unearned  welfare handouts to lower-income citizens, calling it tax reductions.This sort of social justice collides head-on with the reality of  human nature, and it is directly antithetical to the Constitution.   As James Madison noted in Federalist No. 10:"…As long as the reason of man continues fallible, and he is at  liberty to exercise it, different opinions will be formed. As long as  the connection subsists between his reason and his self-love, his  opinions and his passions will have a reciprocal influence on each  other; and the former will be objects to which the latter will attach  themselves. The diversity in the faculties of men, from which the  rights of property originate, is not less an insuperable obstacle to  a uniformity of interests. The protection of these faculties is the  first object of government. From the protection of different and  unequal faculties of acquiring property, the possession of different  degrees and kinds of property immediately results; and from the  influence of these on the sentiments and views of the respective  proprietors, ensues a division of the society into different  interests and parties."Another aspect of Senator Obama's social justice is affirmative  action.  People of favored social, economic, sexual, or racial  classes are to be given preferences over people who are better  qualified.  Affirmative action can be imposed by legislative act,  bureaucratic regulation, or judicial activism.Even though it will mean fewer jobs and a lowered standard of living  for all Americans, Senator Obama will support labor union efforts to  crimp or rescind NAFTA, stop the trade agreement with Colombia (one  of our strongest allies in latin America), and to impose higher  restrictive tariffs and workplace regulations to protect over-paid  jobs for the small minority of Americans who belong to unions.Democrat/Socialists are unconcerned with the destructive impact of  supporting union extortion.  After all, unions (especially the  teachers' unions) are one of their two biggest sources of campaign  contributions and campaign workers.To see a reprise of liberal-progressive "hopes" for an Obama regime  that will impose radical feminist definitions of equality, read  Catherine A. Mackinnon's opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal.http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122455083611552585.htmlFor those in today's younger generation, Ms. Mackinnon's name is  likely to be unfamiliar.  She burst upon the public stage in the  1970s, as another disturbing manifestation of the top-to-bottom  reorientation of society demanded by left-wing radicals of the Baby  Boomer era (among whom were Senator Obama's friends, councilors, and  political backers, Weatherman terrorist founders Bill Ayers and  Bernadine Dohrn).According to the Legal Encyclopedia,"Between 1979 and 1989, MacKinnon was a visiting professor at a  number of prominent law schools, including her alma mater, Yale.  Though she was a prolific writer and a popular teacher, her views and  her actions concerning pornography made her a controversial public  figure. Her radical feminist theories challenged the legitimacy of  the legal system and mainstream liberal thought. She argued that men,  as a class, have dominated women, creating gender inequality. This  inequality is the consequence of a systematic subordination rather  than a product of irrational discrimination. Thus, heterosexuality is  a social arrangement with men dominant and women submissive. Gender,  for radical feminists, is a question of power."In MacKinnon's view, pornography is a powerful tool of the dominant  male class, subordinating women and exposing them to rape and other  abusive behavior. In 1982 she and feminist author AndreaDworkin  convinced the Indianapolis city council to enact a pornography  ordinance that expressed their theory of sexual subordination. The  ordinance described pornography as "a discriminatory practice based  on sex which denies women equal opportunity in society," and defined  it as "the graphic sexually explicit subordination of women, whether  in pictures or words," especially in a violent or degrading context.  The ordinance made unlawful the production, sale, exhibition, and  distribution of pornography and gave anyone injured by a person who  has seen or read pornography the right to bring a civil suit against  the maker or seller."Supporters of the ordinance argued that the legislation was a civil  rights measure meant to fight sex discrimination. In their view the  ordinance regulated conduct rather than free speech and thus did not  violate the FirstAmendment."The Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals, in American Booksellers Ass'n,  Inc. v. Hudnut, 771 F.2d 323 (1985), overturned the ordinance. The  court agreed that pornography affected how people view the world and  their social relations but observed that the same could be said of  other protected speech, including expressions of racial bigotry. To  permit the MacKinnon-Dworkin approach would give the government  control of "all institutions of culture" and allow it to be the  "great censor and director of which thoughts are good for us."Mackinnon is anxious to see a socialist majority in the Supreme Court  that will overturn the American Booksellers Ass'n, Inc. v. Hudnut  ruling and will "discover" unsuspected feminist rights that  heretofore were hidden somewhere in the deep shadows of the  Constitution.What better route to social justice than simply to order businesses  to pay the wages liberal-progressives believe ought to be paid?  to  order that women be given more than half of all executive positions?   to impose her earlier idea that all sexual intercourse, within the  bonds of marriage or not, is statutory rape subjecting males to  criminal prosecution?Thomas E. Brewton is a staff writer for the New Media Alliance, Inc.  The New Media Alliance is a non-profit (501c3) national coalition of  writers, journalists and grass-roots media outlets.