[37035]

"Where exactly did the people grant the government the power to regulate private business?"



Uh, I may be mistaken but I believe somewhere in Article I of the Constitution of the United States of America the government is given the right to regulate interstate commerce.



But maybe you're right. Maybe businesses should be able to conduct themselves anyway they want. Just think, a company could refuse to hire women, restaurants could refuse service to whomever they please, banks could refues to loan money to people based on their religion. What a world VWW is envisioning!



The assertion that the government has "no LEGAL means" to regulate private enterprise is ridiculous.



The business of "rights" is a little more complicated than VWW admits to in his post. Unfortunately, "your" rights and "my" rights bump into each other from time to time and it is government's role to sort it out. If you don't like the way gov't is doing it, then vote them out.

 

[37035]

Damn, people have been getting off since I last checked.

I should know better than to get dragged in to this crap, but once more into the...



Your interpretation of the constitution is like your mind, hopelessly narrow. The founding fathers did not intend to construct a complete laundry list. To suggest they did is baseless. The Constitution was drafted to be mutable within the systems defined (exec,leg,jud)and there are cues to that throughout the constitution and throughout the writings of its authors, especially the federalists.

You find a narrow reading of listed powers compelling in regards to the scope of legislative authority, but ignore it as it relates to the limits on legislative authority and provide no reasoning for doing so. The fact that there are two lists (scope and limits)indicates that the founding fathers saw room for interpretation and change. If they did not foresee this dynamic, then one list would have sufficed. The founding fathers could have just listed those powers expressly allowed and been done with it. Your argument would make some sense in that scenario. However, that is not the way they chose to go and they did so for good reason.



Your argument has been lost twice. Once at the Constitutional Convention and again with the Civil War. Maybe you can start a new confederacy in Cuba after Castro dies.



Other points:

"Life, Liberty etc" is not in the constitution it's in the Declaration of Independence which, while a wonderful work of prose, has no legal standing.



Did I see someone use the Federalist papers to advance a Jeffersonian position?



Someone raised the question of whether an insurance company issuing me an insurance policy for my state in my state is actually inter-state commerce. He may actually have a point.



"Froman", you may like to believe that you would thrive in your (for lack of a better term) libertarian paradise but I imagine your existence would be rather Hobbesian; miserable and short.

 

[37035]

Your true colors are revealed. The Confederacy is dead and most of us don't want it back. If there is a president who needs to be stripped of his cult of personality it is Jefferson not Lincoln. I say it again: your argument has been lost and your vision rejected. Any defense of the Confederacy is intolerable. It takes two to tango. Had the southern states not insisted on clinging to the historical abomination of American slavery, the war could have been averted, regardless of Lincoln's alleged machinations. Without a cause such as slavery, the Union would have had a much more difficult time raising the political will or army necessary to defeat the Confederacy. The fact that proponents of "state's rights" chose slavery as the issue on which to make their stand exposes their moral bankruptcy. Go home and count your Confederate dollars. They will buy you as much as your outmoded opinions.

 

[37035]

Read more closely. My line said "for my state, in my state". Such a policy probably doesn't exist, but as a hypothetical it (along with your observation)shows where the line between the two forms of commerce can be blurred in today's advanced economy.



Be careful when dismissing too many of these arguments as "fourth grade constitutional interpretations". Belittling them in such a manner ignores the power they have with many people. People who may live next to you and who may do something about it. The reality of the threat these people may pose is far too serious to be so casually dismissed.

 

[37035]

All indications I have (not the least of which is your ringing endorsement) indicate that DiLorenzo's book is is about 25% substance and 75% crap. I have read multiple sources which examine the economic factors (read: non-altrusitic anti-slavery reasons)that contributed to the Civil War. While these factors were siginificant, they by no means were sufficient enough to motivate the majority of northerners to march to war. Any informed analysis of the causes of the Civil War will recognize the myriad of factors at play. People like yourself are much more comfortable digesting a ridiculously simplistic conspiracy theory than actually trying to understand history. For DiLorenzo's position to be advanced, one would have to accept the proposition that Abraham Lincoln was the most inteligent and effective leader in the history of the known world. The over-emphasis on Lincoln one way or the other is ridiculous. I doubt volunteers for the (thankfully victorious) Union Army were moved by the esoteric motives you and DiLorenzo ascribe to Lincoln. These people fought the war and the issue of slavery was a necessary motivator for their particpation and victory. To disregard this factor is convenient ignorance.



Please go back to your bunker and wait for the CIA/FBI/Masons/Luminati/WTO to "come ane get you". Oh yeah, stop posting, "they" can track it....

 

[37035]

What I am afraid of is ignorance and the contemptable sorts it breeds.

 

[37035]

I don't worry too much in the comfort of my own home and what I wear to bed is my business (and that of the the secret agents watching on camera).

I AM alarmed that much of the bogus rhetoric you spout has been used to motivate people to bomb their fellow citizens in Oklahoma City and Atlanta. These sorts of despicable and cowardly actions do worry me and they should worry you even if you are on the side of the cowardly whack jobs.

 

[37035]

Re: Excellent Post

Thank you for bringing the JPFO to my attention. Outstanding.

 

[37035]

Follow the thread back to where it started. My point was that even the most poorly reasoned and informed arguments from the most mentally challenged can become dangerous in the wrong hands. The concept of racially superiority is scientifically and logically bankrupt yet it has been used to advance atrocities. I know nowhere near enough (but more than I care)about you, VWW or anybody else on this board, so I did not mean to ascribe any of these (violent) motives to you. The arguments many on this board have advanced, however, are the same as those used by various whack jobs. I occasionally feel compelled to check the spewing of these fallacies. To sum: Because something is simple does not mean it should be ignored. That is why I am responding to you.

 

[37035]

OK, to call Hitler a left winger is silly. Re-read (I'm giving you some credit here) history. He was nominally a socialist, yet even a cursory review of his ideology would find the two at odds.

As for the name calling, I only responded in kind. If any of my responses were ad hominen it is because there is little intellect to appeal to on your side of the argument. (pat yourself on the back, I gave you the response you wanted).



Because someone is not a self-styled libertarian whack job does not make them a "commie" I am far from a socialist or even a contemporary liberal. A classic liberal perhaps, yet I find much of Burke as appealing as I find Mill. I haven't read either in nearly 10 years. Perhaps I should dig out one of the two. It may help cleanse my mind of all the dribble that has been thrown at it here.

 

[37035]

I read more than one book a year and carefully choose which I spend my time on. I read reviews, ask for feedback from people whose opinions I respect and choose from there. If I read every silly diatribe some whiny toad suggested just to refute it, I would never have the time to read anything decent. This conversation could have perhaps been edifying if you had had the ability and/or willingness to actually argue some of DiLorenzo's points instead of just shouting that I should read his book.



One reason I participate in these sorts of discussions is to learn from other viewpoints. I find by challenging someone's views at the extreme you can often get their best argument. That hasn't happened here and in fact it rarely happens when you deal with zealots who are far left, far right or far out in space. This is one lesson, I admit, I am slow in learning. I also admit that, unfortunately, I too easily sink to my fellow conversant's level, hence the (as your faithful follower seruzwa (sp?) pointed out) occasional ad hominem remark. However, I must admit that those sort of remarks (and the responses they evoke)do amuse me greatly, even if they occasionally distract from the discussion. I am sure at some point this discussion will be rejoined, but for now........

 

[37035]

By the law of inverse proportionality if you think I am an idiot I am a certifiable genius. As for Senator Clinton's writings, the only credit I give them is that they are marketed as the personal ramblings/crap that they are, while DiLorenzo puts a weak facade of academia on his work. If you really think I thought you and seruzawa had any real connection, you totally missed the point. A conspiracy? Those of your ilk have not the ability or numbers. Random, semi-organized acts of stupidity perhaps, but a true conspiracy is not a possibility.