"In a democracy (‘rule by mob’), those who refuse to learn from history will be the majority and will dictate that everyone else suffer for their ignorance."
The ONLY “negotiating” that remains to be done with Iran (or any other rogue state) seems to me to be to set those puppies down and say once, and once only,
Meddle thou not in the affairs of dragons, for thou art crunchy and good with ketchup
After that, their fate would be in their own hands.
Just a thought, Condi…
1. Repeal the 17th Amendment
2. Limit the terms of congresscritters
3. Amend the 14th Amendment to clarify “and subject to the jurisdiction thereof” to explicity exclude citizenship to ALL children born to illegal aliens (as the original Senate discussion of the amendment would support*, contra 20th century bureaucratic fiat from Foggy Bottom)
4. It may seem trivial at first, unworthy of an amendment to the Constitution, but think it through a bit… Institute a halt to any further federal holidays, ending with one last one mentioned in the amendment: National Potomoc Day, where the entire electorate is invited to descend upon Congress like locusts and devour its substance, dunk congresscritters, bureaucraps, judges and justices, president, vp, cabinet members, etc. in the Potomoc, and party on from there… Hey! It’d work for me.
5. Add real teeth to the 10th amendment. Madison’s “The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the federal government, are few and defined” as eventually embodied in the Constitution itself and emphasized in the 10th amendment is routinely ignored by the “feddle gummint” we have today. Let’s have an amendment that requires each and every bill and each and every bureuacratic fiat to be specifically justified by specific wording in the Constitution itself–as explicitly explained by the Framers themselves in their own words–authorizing such bill or bureaucratic ruling. Right there: reduce the budget by 90%. Specific exception made to “cruel and unusual punishment” for federal government employees of any kind convicted of abuse of the Constitution. Forfeiture of all worldly possessions for any congresscritter or bureaucrap (and their extended families) who violates this amendment. Banishment and eternal reprobation without absolution, amnesty, pardon, or remission to follow. Erasure of such persons’ names from all records public and private. Made into complete non-persons. Shunned, avoided, eschewed, ostracized. Made absolute pariah, to be spat upon, abused, debased, tortured and maligned at will by any citizen. IOW, kindness, generosity and mercy beyond measure extended to such vile vermin.
Now, don’t you like those proposals for amendments to our Constitution? Would they not indeed be aids in restoring the representative republic we’ve long lost? I certainly think them moderate, restrained, well-measured responses to the overweening anarcho-tyranny that our “feddle gummint” has become.
*heh*
*During the original debate over the amendment, Senator Jacob Howard of Ohio, the author of the citizenship clause described the clause as . . . excluding not only Indians but “persons born in the United States who are foreigners, aliens, [or] who belong to the families of ambassadors or foreign ministers.”
The danger of arguing the pragmatic against the principled is that pragmatism always depends upon fallible human prognostication: it’s a gamble. Sometimes things break with the odds as the pragmatic sees them. Sometimes not. A lot can depend on knowing enough up front. Only hindsight can be 20-20, though even with hindsight the human tendency to rewrite history to favor whoever has the power to do so–and thus fake a better outcome than truly exists–is always a problem as well… *sigh*
The problem with choosing principles over pragmatism is even more complicated. First, in today’s society where often principles are argued against simply because they are about right and wrong and post-rational post modernism sees “right and wrong” as meaningless–except where “principles” of post-rational post modern are concerned, of course–simply asserting principles exist can be dangerous for the asserter. The minefield of such meaningless stances as “Right to Choose”–which means the right to deny a child the right to choose whether it wantsd to be born or not–is fraught with peril.
And that’s just the fetid grounding of today’s social setting. Political? Simply defending principles such as freedom of political speech by citizens in the face of McCain-Feingold* is literally dangerous to a citizen’s continued existence outside of iron bars.
Nevertheless, sometimes it’s profitable to at least ask, “Is what we’ll gain by this pragmatic decision–even if it works as planned–worth what it will cost us in the long run?”
Now, that sounds rather like meta-pragmatism, doesn’t it? *heh* Well, that’s how principles work.
Specifics:
Wall Street/banking bailout.
Short term gain: stabilize the economy.
Medium-term gain: the “feddle gummint” could reap over $2Trillion on the “investment” of $700Billion. (Yeh, read Andy Kessler’s WSJ article at the link. He could be right about the medium-term outcomes.) Now, if (BIG “IF”!) that potential gain were to actualize and be applied only toward federal debt or even to set up an inviolate Social Security fund, untouchable for expenditures apart from retirement payments to those who’ve paid into the system, I’d not be as concerned about
Long-term loss: free markets. Bailouts of those who supporedt alien invaders with junk loans. Greedy, avaricious, thieves who profitted from losses they caused with their bad management of other people’s money (and yes, that specifically includes all the politicians who actively pressured lenders to throw bad money after good in mortgages to people who could not pay for them).
Since any “profits” that the federal government coffers might gain from the bailout will, if history is any guide at all, simply be wasted on more unconstitutional spending rather than be used for commonsense things like reducing the debt load, that leaves only the short-term gains to balance the long-term losses to a free market.
Even a pragmatic person might see that violating principle here could be too costly, no?
Addendum: Maybe we could push for an amendment to the Constitution requiring a personal response to “I, Pencil” from every “feddle gummint” bureaucrap and elected official before allowing them to suck at the public teat. Perhaps then we’d be able to weed a few out who have less understanding of free market principles than a head of cabbage does. Perhaps. (I suspect most would simply crib from a Cliff Notes dumbing down of the already simple little didactic story.)
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Yeh, yeh. Well, it’s not “a rich man’s world” as far as I’m concerned. America’s Third World County has a different model of “rich” than the media, I’m sure, but even at that, very few of our “rich” have a disproportionate impact on our daily lives here*, which is why I’ve not posted much here about the Wall Street/banking brouhaha.
One thing I’ve been waiting for has finally peeped its head over the wall of silence, though. Michelle Malkin is flagging the elephant in the boardrooms: the impact of alien invaders on the banking bust of 08.
Regional reports across the country have decried the subprime meltdown’s impact on illegal immigrant “victims.” A July report showed that in seven of the 10 metro areas with the highest foreclosure rates, Hispanics represented at least one-third of the population; in two of those areas – Merced and Salinas-Monterey, Calif. – Hispanics comprised half the population. The amnesty-promoting National Council of La Raza and its Development Fund have received millions in federal funds to “counsel” their constituents on obtaining mortgages with little to no money down; the group almost succeeded in attaching a $10 million earmark for itself in one of the housing bills past this spring.
For the last five years, I’ve reported on the rapidly expanding illegal alien home loan racket. The top banks clamoring for their handouts as their profits plummet, led by Wachovia and Bank of America, launched aggressive campaigns to woo illegal alien homebuyers.
(See the article for links embedded in it.)
Yep. On top of the billions upon billions of dollars siphoned off our economy in remittance money sent back to Mexico, the impact on health and education services of 20million alien invaders, the resurgence of diseases once virtually eliminated in the U.S. and a alien invader crime wave that annually surpasses in deaths the cumulative totals of servicemen killed in both Iraq and Afganistan from all causes, we have alien invaders defaulting on subprime loans.
And these loan defaults are the fault of politicians and bureaucrats of both parties dragging their heels over (or engaging in deliberate sabotage of) enforcement of already existing immigration law, compelling loans to subprime markets–including illegal aliens–and failing to oversee the quasi-governmental bodies the politicians are responsible for creating.
To his (very minimal) credit, McCain did at least push for stronger oversight of Fannie and Freddie, though he has done nothing to stem the tide of alien invaders. The Obamassiah, of course, was too busy accepting “pocket lining” from Freddie and Fannie lobbyists to look into what those organs were doing up his posterior.
So, just remember when The One attacks his opponents on the economy, he is the number two piggie at the trough sucking up money from the slop that started the cascade of failures on Wall Street.
But neither candidate–The Obamassiah or Juan Mexicain–have clean hands on the alien invader issue, although Juan has lately come around to admitting we need serious border/immigration enforcement before we can even consider any other steps to address the alien invader problems.
I just hope it’s more than electioneering bushwah.
*There is one family that does still exercise disproportionate power in the county, because they own a small telco that serves several communities comprising a majority of the population. Fortunately, cable providers and cell phone use are cutting their influence down to size.
Trackposted to The Pink Flamingo, Leaning Straight Up, Cao’s Blog, Democrat=Socialist, Dumb Ox Daily News, and The World According to Carl, thanks to Linkfest Haven Deluxe.