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Wednesday, January 11, 2006 - 3:17amSanction this postReply
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Robert,

How refreshing to see an intelligent article on checks and balances! That is the main principle behind a successfully functioning democratic government based on individual rights.

I wonder if it would even be possible to organize some political movement to start restoring traditional checks and balances that have been breached. I can think of no political goal that is more noble at the present. The 17th Amendment might be a bit ambitious for now, but it is an excellent way of showing the danger of unchecked imbalance in the government.

Congratulations.

Michael


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Wednesday, January 11, 2006 - 7:47amSanction this postReply
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This may be considered a hijack. So be it.

Robert Davison starts his article:
Jack Abramoff and the Indian givers remind us once again of the byzantine fixes in support finance reform. They are only exceeded by proposed fixes for the tax code; if such a superlative is even possible. A believer in Occam’s razor would say, "Simply restore the 17th Amendment," but, I fear such a simplistic solution would never satisfy garrulous lawmakers.
Is there an editor around? If there is, should he not see to it that obvious errors and even unclear writing be corrected before an article is published?

Shouldn't there be an "of" between "support" and "finance"?

Are they "only exceeded by" or are they really "exceeded only by"?

Where/what is the referenced superlative?

Why would anyone advocate restoring the 17th Amendment? When was it ever repealed or amended?

What does the loquaciousness of lawmakers have to do with the 17th Amendment?

Those are just a few of the problems I have with the first paragraph. Can the rest be worth reading?

Post 2

Wednesday, January 11, 2006 - 8:21amSanction this postReply
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Michael,

Thank you for your kind words.  This essay lanquished for several weeks in the queue.  I had assumed it would never see light.  Political thought is a major interest of mine, but it is not all that popular here.

The astonishing insight that the founder's brought to our constitution never ceases to amaze me.  The praxeological considerations that informed their opinions, thought to be dour and pessimistic by some, I believe were well founded.


I wonder if it would even be possible to organize some political movement to start restoring traditional checks and balances that have been breached. I can think of no political goal that is more noble at the present.

Libertarians were organized ostensibly for that purpose, but the movement has disintegrated into a repetitious, never ending debate between min-archists and anarcho-capitalists. Their political influence, aside from 1 senator from Texas, has not extended beyond school boards and local town councils.

Objectivist sites tend to avoid politics because of the tendentious nature of debates that produce more heat than light.  A forum dedicated to constitutional issues might fare better. 



Post 3

Wednesday, January 11, 2006 - 8:22amSanction this postReply
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Thanks for bringing attention to the senatorial-election provision of the 17th Amendment. This should be repealed.

It is bad enough that Senators spend their time and energy getting re-elected. At least as important is their failure to stand up for what is right, for apparent fear of being portrayed in a light that would keep them from being re-elected, or that would make them unpopular enough so as to foreclose further opportunities.

Why, for example, did the US Senate fail to conduct a genuine trial of Clinton for his mafioso-like behavior? Were they afraid of going up against the lies-about-sex propaganda machine? Were they afraid of the release of material acquired during the Co-President's Filegate scandal? It is difficult to believe that they were so mindless as to enter into utter dishonor without a motive, even if the modern pseudo-debate election process promotes mindlessness over substance, cunning over conscience.

And why did Congress and the President go along with lowlifes McCain and Feingold, in abolishing the 1st Amendment's protection of core political speech? A look at the attempts at ostensible reform long ago, during the final decades of the Roman Republic, is educational; the backers of such bills got an undeserved reputation for opposition to corruption -- bills then, as now, being named after them -- and their supporters got to bask in the same false light. Even if you credit the Roman Senate with a genuine, long-term intent, despite the acknowledged incentives, you have to wonder why they failed to address fundamental matters of the accretion of power.

Whither the US republic? It is unlikely nowadays that there would be a reneged-upon election-law exemption such as motivated Caesar to cross the Rubicon. More likely is the then-not-uncommon phenomenon of the entrapment even of well-intentioned politicians in a propaganda-and-punishment web of campaign restrictions; this would likely continue to take the form of spineless behavior on unrelated matters, rather than risking overt prosecution -- even at the tipping point.


Post 4

Wednesday, January 11, 2006 - 8:31amSanction this postReply
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Rick,

You are correct, the "of" should be there.  "only" is a matter of perference, and "simply restore" should be "simply repeal".

Thank you for pointing out these errors.  I should have been more careful.

b


Post 5

Wednesday, January 11, 2006 - 8:52amSanction this postReply
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Rick,

I should have caught those errors. Unfortunately I've been working 18 hour days for the past week, so I'm not at tip-top performance.

Ethan


Post 6

Wednesday, January 11, 2006 - 8:53amSanction this postReply
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The placement of "only" is not a matter of preference. It affects the meaning of the sentence.

I suspect you meant "Representative" rather than "senator" in post #2.

BTW, 1913 was the year of the income tax (16th Amendment), popular election of Senators (17th Amendment), and the creation of the Federal Reserve Bank. Not a good year.

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Post 7

Wednesday, January 11, 2006 - 9:01amSanction this postReply
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Rick,

Sorry I can't please you.


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Post 8

Wednesday, January 11, 2006 - 12:10pmSanction this postReply
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Robert,

I have had several frustrating exchanges with anarcho-capitalists and even minarchists about checks-and-balances. This is the great BLANK-OUT of Libertarianism.

The discussions I have had always sidestep this issue and go off into completely useless discussions of NIOF, elevating it to a metaphysical law, dreams of having no government at all, usually a complete misunderstanding of the nature of rights (trying to postulate a concept of rights that excludes the context of society), marketplace competition on the use of armed force, and a whole lot of things I find just plain silly.

Meanwhile, the real breach of checks-and-balances that is providing an ever-increasing growth of government power is ignored. And that growth steadily goes on - simply because it is not properly identified so it can be combated.

Frankly, I see that this head-in-the-sand approach by Libertarians and Objectivists make them the greatest friends statists ever had. Issues like rights are constantly discussed in fancy language, but basically in terms of nonessentials, and all this serves as a very efficient smoke-screen to hide the gradual repeal of checks-and-balances within the government (especially the ones that protect individual rights).

Unchecked imbalance in government = autocratic power.

That's simple enough to understand. That is, unless you think that power is not a human reality that needs to be dealt with and simply blank it out.

Michael

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Wednesday, January 11, 2006 - 1:22pmSanction this postReply
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Robert, it's not a matter of pleasing me. It's a matter of writing factually and grammatically correct statements.

Post 10

Wednesday, January 11, 2006 - 1:27pmSanction this postReply
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It now appears that Michael is the one who is attempting to hijack the thread with his irrelevant and uncalled for slurs on libertarians and anarcho-capitalists.

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Post 11

Wednesday, January 11, 2006 - 1:38pmSanction this postReply
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Robert Davison, please do not respond to those who forgot to refill their Lithium prescription.

 

BTW, I enjoyed your article; your message was clear and on target.

 

 

George

(Edited by George W. Cordero on 1/11, 1:43pm)


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Post 12

Wednesday, January 11, 2006 - 2:13pmSanction this postReply
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I agree George!

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Post 13

Wednesday, January 11, 2006 - 2:21pmSanction this postReply
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M. Pasotto, there is no such thing as an uncalled-for slur on anarchists. Throwing yourself in with their lot is throwing yourself down with the neo-confederates, paleo-conservatives and Rockwellians. Try to keep better company.

Post 14

Wednesday, January 11, 2006 - 2:37pmSanction this postReply
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Hooray for guilt by association!

Sarah

Post 15

Wednesday, January 11, 2006 - 4:02pmSanction this postReply
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Rick,

All right. I'll play for another spin.

Any thoughts on the principle of checks-and-balances?

Michael


Edit - btw, I didn't just talk about "libertarians and anarcho-capitalists" in my post above, but also included minarchists and Objectivists as well. So, strictly speaking, are my "irrelevant and uncalled for slurs" on minarchists and Objectivists relevant and called for?

(Edited by Michael Stuart Kelly on 1/11, 6:30pm)


Post 16

Wednesday, January 11, 2006 - 4:20pmSanction this postReply
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No thoughts, just finger wagging :-)

Post 17

Thursday, January 12, 2006 - 11:50amSanction this postReply
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Well, Sarah, sorry to say it, but it tends to be true in intellectual circles: if you hang with, support and write for anarchist fools, then I am going to presume you at least sympathize with their totalitarian aims.

Post 18

Thursday, January 12, 2006 - 11:57amSanction this postReply
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Steven,

At the risk of tangenting, we both are on this forum and I don't know if there's something we do agree on.

And how the hell do you get totalitarian from anarchist? That one just completely blows my mind.

Sarah

Post 19

Thursday, January 12, 2006 - 1:14pmSanction this postReply
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Sarah, at risk of sounding dogmatic, I got it by following Ayn Rand's thoughts on anarchy (maybe you've heard of her):

"Anarchy, as a political concept, is a naive floating abstraction: ... a society without an organized government would be at the mercy of the first criminal who came along and who would precipitate it into the chaos of gang warfare."

Yeah, so, perpetual gang warfare, with one gang eventually winning out, sounds like totalitarianism to me.

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