EDITORIAL – Ah, liberty, the crimes committed in thy name

The right to demonstrate peacefully may be guaranteed in the Constitution, but it is not absolute. It stops dead where the rights of a far greater number of people become jeopardized. In a democracy, the minority may be heard, but it is the majority that has the last say.

The right to demonstrate can be curtailed both by the right of the state to protect itself and the right of the majority to be unhampered in its own pursuits. Nevertheless, the state, like a good parent, is in no mood to completely shut out the marginalized.

Hence its policy of " no permit, no rally. " Such a policy, contrary to the claims of close-minded oppositionists and leftists, is not oppressive. It is, in fact, as magnanimous as it is fair.

The policy does not rule out rallies. Instead it protects the right of the state to determine what is the best course of action for everybody. It can give a permit to rally when it deems it all right to do so, or it can withhold giving such a permit at its discretion.

The trouble with oppositionists and leftists is that they reject system in favor of mayhem. The rallies they organize are not meant to air grievances because there are a thousand other ways to do so. Instead, rallies are their tools to provoke the state and force its hand.

The policy is very clear. If you have a permit, you can rally. But the provocateurs would have none of that. They want to do things their way and damn if it violates the law or greatly inconveniences others. That's why you never see them even try to secure a permit.

They dread being given a permit because it would legitimize their demonstration and thus eliminate the opportunity to provoke a confrontation. A confrontation can easily be made to degenerate into violence.

And better believe that these provocateurs actually long to get bashed on the head. There is a certain romanticism in getting hurt ostensibly in a fight for " democratic rights. " Such romanticism, however, is misplaced, is anachronistic.

Democracy has flowered in this country. Indeed, it is abloom to the point of suffocation, such that we are now gagging under the excessive liberties invoked by rallyists and even by such once-venerable institutions as the Senate, liberties taken at the expense of citizens.