Time & Perspective Quote by Jeff Bingaman

It’s a line built to sound timeless while doing very immediate political work. “This is not a time” is the classic urgency trigger: it frames the present moment as a test, a hinge point where neutrality becomes complicity. Bingaman doesn’t name the crisis, the bill, the war, the scandal, the court ruling, the budget fight - whatever sparked the remark. That omission is the point. By keeping the threat vague, the sentence can be attached to nearly any controversy, letting listeners project their own anxieties onto it.

“Back away” is also carefully chosen. It implies retreat, even cowardice, rather than policy disagreement. If someone wants to revise a precedent, recalibrate power, or compromise, this phrasing casts them as shrinking from duty. That’s how the quote polices the boundaries of acceptable debate without ever stating what’s inside them.

Then comes the real rhetorical weapon: “the principles that this country was founded on.” Founding language carries built-in authority, but it’s notoriously elastic. Which principles? Liberty, equality, limited government, religious freedom, property rights, pluralism, rule of law - Americans invoke the founding to argue for radically different outcomes. Bingaman’s intent is to borrow that prestige while avoiding a checklist that could be contested.

As a politician’s sentence, it’s less a thesis than a coalition-building device: a patriotic umbrella broad enough for allies, a moral warning shot across opponents’ bows, and a subtle reminder that in American politics, legitimacy is often won by claiming the past.