Category: Constitution

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I Concur

Th= Kentucky Resolutions of November 1798 and December 1799 are instructive, I think, regarding at least a significant number of Founders’ views. Though penned by Thomas Jefferson (and enacted by the Kentucky legislature), Madison expressed similar views in the December 1798 Virginia Resolution, approved by the Virginia Senate. The second point in the 1798 Kentucky Resolution is particularly instructive, and expresses a view I have long held,

Resolved, That the Constitution of the United States, having delegated to Congress a power to punish treason, counterfeiting the securities and current coin of the United States, piracies, and felonies committed on the high seas, and offenses against the law of nations, and no other crimes, whatsoever; and it being true as a general principle, and one of the amendments to the Constitution having also declared, that “the powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, not prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people,” therefore the act of Congress, passed on the 14th day of July, 1798, and intituled “An Act in addition to the act intituled An Act for the punishment of certain crimes against the United States,” as also the act passed by them on the — day of June, 1798, intituled “An Act to punish frauds committed on the bank of the United States,” (and all their other acts which assume to create, define, or punish crimes, other than those so enumerated in the Constitution,) are altogether void, and of no force; and that the power to create, define, and punish such other crimes is reserved, and, of right, appertains solely and exclusively to the respective States, each within its own territory.

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Why Even Have a Constitution?

Yeh, random thought? No, Hollyweird program featuring “feddle gummint” law enFARCEment at its. . . contemporary norm spurred this.

“The powers of the Legislature are defined and limited; and that those limits may not be mistaken or forgotten, the Constitution is written. To what purpose are powers limited, and to what purpose is that limitation committed to writing, if these limits may at any time be passed by those intended to be restrained? The distinction between a government with limited and unlimited powers is abolished if those limits do not confine the persons on whom they are imposed, and if acts prohibited and acts allowed are of equal obligation.”

The US Constitution was intended and designed to circumscribe, restrain, LIMIT federal powers, to first prevent it from infringing on individuals’ rights while enabling it to have just enough power to protect individuals from those who would infringe on those rights, but only in areas where the states did not already have that responsibility.

Now, “feddle gummint” powers have been so illegitimately stretched, the Constitution seems to largely be a dead letter, trotted out to be disingenuously twisted into support for whatever “feddle gummint” overstep is the latest power grab, and “stare decisis” means whatever is convenient.

*shrugs*

What to do. You tell me.

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Rights: Whence Come They?

Sidebar: I avoid terms like “gun rights,” because the real issue is the inherent right of every individual to defend one’s own life and limb against an aggressor (individual or group) doing or threatening to do harm, and to defend his loved ones and the otherwise defenseless innocent from the same. Guns are just one of many tools (excellent and effective tools, indeed often the best of tools, but one of many) for effecting legitimate self-defense.

I also do not like the terms “constitutional rights” or “2nd Amendment right” for similar reasons, but expanding to include the fact that those rights which arementioned in the constitution are mentioned only to prevent infringement of those rights by the federal government.

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Did Edward Snowden Break the Law in Revealing the Depth and Breadth of the NSA’s Surveillance of Citizens?

For those excoriating Edward Snowden for “breaking the law” I’ll say this: I don’t know and I don’t care. I don’t know, because I haven’t–and probably won’t–research the relevant laws, because I do not care whether he broke any in revealing the NSA’s surveillance of ordinary citizens.

Here’s why that is: ANY time a citizen shed’s light on government mistreatment of its citizens’ rights it is a Good Thing, no matter what his motivation, no matter what laws he breaks to do so. Any laws that even ALLOW the government to cover abuses are anathema to me, and should be to every citizen who lives; they are nothing short of being bad faith with the social contract the Founders recognized which establishes that government exists to protect our rights, not abuse or deny to us the free exercise of them. ANY law or regulation that provides cover for government abuse of citizens’ rights is illegitimate and has no moral force whatsoever, no excuse for existence save for the vile, reprehensible, utterly abhorrent excuse of defending that abuse of power, and that’s a raison d’être that in itself gives adequate cause to sneer at and openly flout disobedience to any such law or regulation.

Apparatchiks in the same party that gave us the death toll of Fast and Furious and Benghazi, the trampling of the First and Fourth Amendments in the AP scandal and the blatant IRS abuses of power have talked with relative comfort about disappearing Snowden. Yeh, what’s a little banana republic terrorist tactic between friends, eh? In the toxic atmosphere of an overweening, anarcho-tyrannist “feddle gummint bureaucrappy” that views everything with an US (the “gummint”) vs Them (former citizens, now subjects) it becomes obvious to anyone who’s not dumber than a sack of Shiite that the “feddle gummint” is cast adrift from a constitutionally-informed social contract designed to protect the rights of citizens and not the turf of politicians *gag-spew* and “bureaucraps” *gagamaggot*.

In such an environment, as I said, ANYONE who for ANY REASON brings government abuses of power into the light of day has done right, no matter what their motivation, no matter what any CYA laws or regulations say.

Doing the right thing, even for wrong reasons, is doing the right thing, no matter what.

One last thing: Edward Snowden may be weird. He may be distasteful in his personal habits, lifestyle or morality. I don’t know and I don’t care. I have seen hints about such things written by people condemning him, though hints only, as I skip over and simply note another ad hominem attack designed to discredit him in the eyes of stupid people. I don’t know Edward Snowden, and I do not particularly care to; not only that, I do not have to know ANYTHING about him apart from the fact that the information he revealed has so far checked out and that it reveals massive abuse of power by the federal government. THAT is ALL that matters in this brouhaha. Period.

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Swamp Their Inboxes

Overwhelm your congresscritters’ and state reps’ inboxes with calls to completely shut down the IRS and salt the legislative and bureaucrappic ground it rests on.

When you’re finished with that, besiege their inboxes with calls for special prosecutors for Fast and Furious, Benghazi and the NSA. Add links wherever possible. Here’s one for NSA crimes against humanity (and make no mistake: NSA’s “Boundless Informant” is just that):

epic.org

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Focusing public attention on emerging privacy and civil liberties issues

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Root and Branch: Extirpate the IRS

Conservative group’s lawsuit targets IRS employees personally

Look, folks, let’s just say it openly and without reservation: The IRS is simply evil. Period. I’ll accept no qualifications about “good people” working in the IRS. No, if they were truly good people, they’d find a job not working for an evil organization. Period. End of story. No excuses.

The fish rots from the head and from its inception, the IRS has rotted and is nothing but a poisonous evil whose sole function is to do evil and enable further evil to be done. Any lame justifications that it collects revenue for legitimate purposes fall, because most “feddle gummint” functions nowadays are constitutionally illegitimate (hence, based on lies, evil). Nope. The IRS has to go. Now, how to get there. . .

Pressure–and never, never, never stop pressuring–congresscritters to abolish the IRS and the oppressive, tyrannical, capricious income tax system it administers. Get involved in local politics in order to gain influence on political parties’ selection of candidates, at ever higher levels of government. Join with other “outsiders” to invade and take over the political apparatus of whatever party or parties you may have a chance to “subvert” to bring them back in line with constitutional principles.

And never, never, NEVER stop pushing back–twice as hard, and harder. If you are attacked, as the person and her organization in the linked article above have been, push back as that organization has. Make it as personal as the bureaucraps themselves make it. Hold them PERSONALLY responsible.

Keep it in bounds–not their bounds, the law’s bounds–but make sure they know it IS personal, because that’s the central meaning of The Founders’ Constitution”–personal, individual liberty and responsibility is THE central reason the Constitution was written to SET BOUNDARIES BEYOND WHICH GOVERNMENT MUST NOT GO!

The “feddle gummint” needs to be told to sit down, shut up and LISTEN to the PEOPLE. . . and then sit down and shut up–PERIOD!–wherever the Constitution says they have no business going.

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“We All Belong to the Government”

Sweet! The 13th Amendment abolished slavery involuntary servitude (except as criminal punishment), effective December 6, 1865, but now the DNC, led by America’s “first ‘black’ *cough* president”–inadvertently (or arrogantly?) lets us in on the dirty little secret: the “feddle gummint” owns us, at least as far as Dhimmicraps are concerned.

Isn’t that special? The Zero is totally focused on keeping his promise to “fundamentally transform” the US… from “the land of the free” to “the home of the ruling classes and their serfs.”

Wear a “Sic Semper Tyrannis” button to vote in November, and make sure the tyrants are defeated at the polls.

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Individual Mandate Picking On Individuals to Tax: UPDATED

[SEE THE FOOT OF THE POST–in the “more” section–FOR AN UPDATE FROM FAIRTAX.ORG]

This post will be pinned to the top of the blog for a week or so. Newer posts will appear below this one.

 

 

 

It seems to me that “individual mandates” as delineated by Justice Roberts’ majority opinion in National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius [pdf file] (the “Obamacare” decision) have long been with us. The “feddle gummint’s” taxation power, exercised through the IRS, has long treated different people differently, taxing some more than others, excluding some from taxation because of behaviors the “feddle gummint” wants to encourage, while taxing those “others” more because they don’t do something the “feddle gummint” wants them to.

It seems to me that the two Very Good Lessons we can draw from this decision are

1. ALL the Dhimmicraps (The Zero and his co-conspirators and the Mass MEdia Podpeople Hivemind and all the Academia Nut Fruitcakes, et al) who promoted Obamacare deliberately, maliciously and wittingly LIED THPOUGH THEIR TEETH to get the thing passed.
2. Justice Roberts very wisely (Niccolò Machiavelli would’ve handed him a gold star) didn’t leave it at obliquely pointing out what liars the Obamacare supporters are but placed the responsibility for fixing the mess where it belongs when he said of the Court:

It is not our job to protect the people from the consequences of their political choices.

Bingo!

My exegesis? If you abhor this law as much as you should, then get up off your fat lazy asses and WORK to elect representatives who will overturn it, and in the future pay more attention to electing representatives who genuinely have the republic’s interests at heart.

Continue reading “Individual Mandate Picking On Individuals to Tax: UPDATED”

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Another Constitutional Amendment, Please?

How about an amendment excluding lawyers from holding positions as Supreme Court Justices or being elected to federal office? And while we’re at it, how about including term limits for EVERY federal office, elected and appointed? Oh, and throw in language carving out an exception to the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition on “cruel and unusual punishment” for any elected or appointed “feddle gummint” official or bureaucrap. Since tarring and feathering have faded from contemporary use and become “unusual” and since the practice may be considered (fairly, I suppose) to be “cruel” we need that exception in order to properly chastise those who desire (and work and scheme and lie, cheat and steal) to be our masters.

Once such an amendment were passed (notice the subjunctive mood? *sigh*), perhaps a few “feddle gummint” goons could be tarred, feathered and given lighted torches to play with on their way out of town… pour encourager les autres, as it were. (Oh, that I would live to see the day!)