Iran, Principles and Dogma
Decapitating the Regime was Moral and Legal
Within the duration of about one minute, American and Israeli military forces schooled the top brass of the Islamic State of Iran in the deeper meaning of F(a)=F0. That was five days ago, February 28, 2026. Since then, every political party in America has weighed in on the constitutionality of President Trump’s decision to use American might. It is altogether fitting and proper they would do that, but it is altogether fitting and proper they understand and are committed to defending our constitutional principles.
Combined with America’s Declaration of Independence, I will summarize those principles as rights, liberty and justice - and further state the natural consequence of rights, liberty and justice as the decentralized structure of capitalism.
It’s also fair to say that nearly everyone reading this is familiar with the positions of the Republican and Democratic parties on the subject, so I will limit this to the obscure parties that are desperate for relevance. My source for that is the journalistic outlet that bills itself as: Your Premier Source on Third Parties and Independent Candidates Since 2008. In an article dated March 4, 2026, The Independent Political Report published the statements of nine of the twelve parties they cover.
Of those nine, only one did not cite constitutional concerns or condemn the actions of the Trump administration: “The Forward Party stands with our troops and the families who support them. We honor their service and pray for the safe return of our service members. We also hold hope for the Iranian people. They deserve freedom, safety, and the chance to shape their own future.” This is Andrew Yang and Christine Todd-Whitman’s outfit.
One from one the oldest, largest and most visible of them: “The Libertarian Party is calling for immediate cessation of the unconstitutional U.S. / Israel joint military operations in Iran, initiated February 28th, under “Operation Epic Fury.” President Donald Trump has explicitly stated that the operation is intended to instill regime change in Iran. Congress has been derelict in its duty to protect its status as arbiter of War Powers.” Bear in mind, the underlying principle of Libertarianism is that war powers and sovereign nations should not exist.
And in a similar vein, “The United States Pirate Party endorsed and republished a statement originally made by Captain James O’Keefe of the Massachusetts Pirate Party. Today, Trump and Israel initiated an illegal war on Iran.” Not to be left out: “The Green Party condemns the Trump administration for its illegal bombing on Iran.”
Arguably for the benefit of Mr. Kite, “The Liberal Party USA gave multiple remarks on social media, including a longer response featuring a reshared statement from party Operations Manager Robert Kraus: The United States is starting another illegal and unconstitutional war citing regime change as the reason” PLUS “Chair Jack Ternan on social media: On June 22, 2025, I issued a condemnation of “President Trump’s unilateral, unjustified, unconstitutional, and unnecessary military action against Iran” on behalf of the American Solidarity Party.
Not surprisingly, two other parties that seem to be wholly owned subsidiaries of the Democratic Party were reported as saying: “The Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) unequivocally condemns the attacks on Iran and violations of its sovereignty” PLUS “The Communist Party USA strongly and unequivocally condemns the Trump administration’s current war on Iran. We call on allies in the peace movement, trade unions, social justice and faith-based movements to join in mass demonstrations and peaceful actions against this war and all the unconstitutional wars being waged by the Trump administration and its allies.”
This is standard operating procedure – to use the Constitution of the United States of America against America. And they get away with it by citing two flaws in the Constitution to justify their war on rights, liberty and justice – aka capitalism: the commerce clause and the general welfare clause. But there are two other political parties - one of the twelve listed in the dropdown of the journal and a new one just added to their coverage, the American Capitalist Party.
Ideologically, these two parties are opposites: “For the Planet to Live Capitalism Must End” and “Dedicated to the Flourishing of Human Life on Earth,” but they have similar objections in their public pronouncements:
The Party for Socialism and Liberation published the following response in Liberation News: The attack on Iran is illegal under both the U.S. Constitution and international law. Wars of aggression are banned under the UN Charter. And the Constitution does not give the president unilateral power to go to war on a whim.
And in a statement labeled Int.For.Pol.00001.000ACPNC, the American Capitalist Party asserted the following position:
In the interest of preserving the long-term liberty of all who live under the protections of our Constitution, we maintain that expediency can never justify the abandonment of principle. Among those principles is the clear constitutional design that the power to declare war rests with the People through their elected representatives, not in the unilateral discretion of the Executive.”
What we have here is 90% of these third parties condemning the actions of the Trump administration (the decision to join with America’s essential ally in the defense capitalism from the medieval savages of Islam) by standing their case on the principles that define and defend Western civilization itself. Nice try. No cigar. As Capitalism Magazine reported on March 3, 2026:
Word-thinkers aren’t necessarily dishonest. They’re often highly intelligent people who’ve learned to manipulate symbols with great precision and have confused that skill for understanding. Watch for it. It’s everywhere. And it is almost never more seductive than when the words in question carry serious moral weight. Constitutional language is a perfect habitat.
And what symbol is being manipulated? Article I, Section 8, Clause 11 of the US Constitution that confers on Congress the power to declare war. Yes, it does! And Article II, Section 2, Clause 1 gives the President command of the military. There is intentional ambiguity here, also summarized in Capitalism:
The framers didn’t draw a bright line because they couldn’t. They gave Congress the power to declare formal, sustained belligerence between nations. They gave the president command of forces in the field, authority to respond to emergencies, and the initiative that military action requires. What they didn’t do—and this matters—is specify the boundary. That ambiguity is not an oversight. It reflects genuine uncertainty about a question no document could resolve in advance.
Let’s be clear. Principles matter. Principles are essential. And rational principles are the only guide for “Flourishing of Human Life on Earth.”
Accordingly, the first principle is reality – the primacy of existence, A is A. And in the context of DJT’s authorization for military action that decapitated the Islamic State of Iran, it was not illegal. It was not unconstitutional. And it was not a unilateral decision or “war on a whim.” There are allies, years of planning and intelligence gathering, intricate details, extraordinary skill and courage, and two of the only rights defending societies in the history of the world. That ain’t nothing.
And to face reality is to acknowledge that DJT is President, he is the civilian commander of America’s military, the Islamic State has been the violent savage aggressor since 1979, Article I does not grant Congress the exclusive authority to attack a vicious enemy, there is the War Powers Act of 1973, and there is an enormous amount of precedent:
Scholars count somewhere between 100 and 200 unilateral uses of military force since the founding. No court has ever invalidated one on constitutional merits. Campbell v. Clinton—where a congressman sued to force a vote authorizing Kosovo—was dismissed. Every similar challenge has been dismissed, on standing or political-question grounds, consistently, across decades.
The second principle is reason. Not only is there the intentional ambiguity of Article I and Article II, but to morally engage in war is to unleash overwhelming violence on the aggressor, achieve victory in minimum time, and do it with the fewest casualties to your own people.
To complicate that, the previous two American presidents and their political party are affiliated with, aligned with, or sympathetic with the Islamic State, the Muslim Brotherhood, the Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), and the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine (UNWRA). That is reality. To seek their advice and consent would be to violate principles one and two.
Furthermore, to face reason is to acknowledge that an objective moral code is an integrated system of principles and values. And all of them must be given their proper due in context with each other and existing circumstances using our best judgement. To isolate Article I does not do that, and to misinterpret Article I is to resort to dogma.
Of the ten political parties mentioned in the opening sequence of this essay, there is only one that is grounded in morally defensible principles, yet the American Capitalist Party resorted to the same dogma of the other parties comprised of enemies of capitalism. I believe the cause is simple, but the rationalization is complex. It’s about Trump. He is a pragmatist and he typically operates on his whim of the moment. He lacks moral principles. He is not an intellectual. That can be dangerous.
In philosophical terms, Trump operates on a primacy of consciousness relationship with reality. He makes it up as he goes along. What is unnerving is that he does the right thing more often and better than his two predecessors. It’s a sight to see. Obama and Biden are destroyers, and it is their regime that gave rise to Trump’s popularity.
Good people who understand and respect natural law and human nature may be aware of the dangers posed by a principle-free emotionalist with political power, but there are context, causality and justice that cannot be ignored. Those are principles, too.
And not mentioned in any of the handwringing above is the fact that those two presidents gave billions of dollars and political cover to the Mullahs, their murderous thugs, and financed the horrific atrocities of October 7th. More recently, thirty or forty thousand Iranians were murdered. Of course, Trump appeases dictators, too, but that is what got us here.
The West paid for the Islamic State, its death is imperative and long overdue, and I hope the people of Iran will begin to prosper later this year. But today, the Islamists of the Middle East will continue to fragment, and the flow of capital will bring peace and justice, as it always does.