Horseshit. An emasculated state (federal) is exactly what our Founding Fathers created. THERE is my historical reference/argument. [/quote]
Absolute nonsense. The Founding Fathers did not argue for an “emasculated” state - they argued for a stronger state than what they had previously under the Articles. The Constitution made the state stronger, not weaker. Go read up.
Now, that isn’t the same as arguing for unlimited government, as the Founders (nor the Constitution) promotes that vision. But, that is very different than an “emasculated” state, which you incorrectly attribute to the Founders. Maybe the Anti-Federalists wanted an "emasculated’ state - but they weren’t the Founders (they lost the argument).
And the funny thing is…you don’t have a single current historical example to reference or an argument to make on this count to refute what I just said.[/quote]
You mean outside of replacing the Articles with the Constitution? The Federalist Papers? The Anit-Federalist Papers? Shays’ Rebellion? The Whiskey Rebellion? George Washington’s farewell address? Thomas Jefferson’s prosecution of Aaron Burr? The Northwest Ordinance?
And let’s be clear - I am not providing evidence for an “ominpotent” federal government; I am, however, providing evidence for a federal government that is far from “emasculated” and was never designed to be.
You want to refute it, fine - but you tried this in the thread where you tried to defend the Confederacy, and your file of evidence was slim, and that’s my kind way of describing its shortcomings.\
Don’t take my word for it - go to any zone where there is inadequate security (think Africa) and you won’t find “liberty fluorishing” anywhere, just armed gangs and short-life expectancies. [/quote]
Who’s creating the straw men? You want to advance the absurdity that I advocated African style anarchy in my positions?[/quote]
That isn’t a straw man, slick - I gave you an example of a real-world instance where the absence of security is far from a place where liberty fluorishes, i.e., if you don’t provide adequate security, you sow the seeds of some very, very bad events, despite the very best of intentions.
Nowhere in my sentence did I ascribe that you like or endorse African-style anarchy, which would be a straw man. C’mon, up your game.
Then you forgot your roots, chum - so can the histrionics of saying on the one hand you understood me and on the other showing a blatant ignorance of the point I was making.[/quote]
Not exactly, and despite your efforts at wanting me to, I haven’t shown an ignorance of the point you were making. I take your point, I ignored your metaphor. That’s it.
You’re just not getting it, horse farm lineage or not, are you?
emasculate: to deprive of strength or vigor; weaken.
Read that a couple of times til it sinks in. Do you see that definition as, to deprive of all strength and vigor; to completely weaken?[/quote]
No, I get it fine - and your choice of words (“emasculate”) continues to haunt you. The Founders wanted a stronger government, so they created one. No problem. It was created with limits. No problem. Did they want a “weak” federal government? Nope.
The Founders didn’t want or intend for an “emasculated” government - they wanted a strong and limited government.
No games, Push - your words. Choose better ones next time. The Founders simply did not intend “to weaken” the government. They knew a strong enough government was needed to fulfill the role of a national government.
Part of the problem is that you have already laid your cards on the table in a prior discussion - and I know from that you think that holding the Union together through force (i.e., using federal power to stave off internal anarchy) was, in your minds, an illegimate use of power, and by extension, an “emasculated” federal government would have never had such a power. Correct me if you think differently.
My point is simple - your version of “emasculation” doesn’t have a corroborating historical predicate, and the Founders intended a less-“emasculated” government that what you prefer (but have little evidence to show for).
I never argued otherwise.
You’re simply argiung with yourself. These two amendments reinforce that their are limits to the federal government - and? Who is disputing this? I’m not. Is anyone else?
If not, then you are headed down another dead-end with another straw man. I don’t discount either amendment (though the 9th Amendment is largely unenforceable by the judiciary and the Tenth is stated as a truism, which doesn’t help with a number of specific issues), so you are wasting your breath.
But, more specific to your point - the Constitution grants a number of expansive powers to the federal government. The Commerce Power, for example, is a pretty damn powerful tool to be used by the feds. Set aside your predictable reaction that federal power under this clause has been used to overreach in areas outside of commerce (on which we agree) - with respect to national commerce itself, there isn’t a credible argument that federal power is “emasculated” under such a broad grant of power. The Commerce Power is broad and quite, er, vigorous, or is capable of being exercised vigorously; there is nothing “weak” about it. If the Founders had wanted an “emasculated” state, they wouldn’t have written in such a broad grant of power into the founding document. Period.
The point is simple - you argue that the Founders wanted some docile federal government. They didn’t. Nor did they want an overintrusive megastate. What they wanted was a federal government strong enough to be supreme in its designated limited spheres of power. Supreme and limited. Not weakened, or deprived of appropriate vigor.
In 1791, the First United States Congress created the First Bank of the United States. There was controversy over whether such an institution was a constitutional exercise of power, but it survived, and thus provides us with pretty darn good evidence that the Founders/First Congress didn’t quite have your “emas-kuh-lett-ed!” version of government in mind - because, after all, “emasculated” governments don’t form central banks, and had the question had been settled among the Founders/First Congress (as you now contend), the legislation would have never been passed at all.
And just to pile on - James Madison, the drafter of the vaunted 9th Amendment, supported the creation of the Second National Bank in 1815. So even the “Federalist” you cite as supporting your “emasculated” state by way of the 9th Amendment he drafted…supported the installation of a national bank.
The true-blue libertarian version of history, well, just ain’t so, and to say so is not a vote for the rise of the megastate. The Ron Paul idiots tried this before, claiming all sorts of nonsense as “constititional history”, and they were sent packing. The history is complicated, but it’s there. Happy reading.
The true-blue libertarian version of history, well, just ain’t so, and to say so is not a vote for the rise of the megastate. The Ron Paul idiots tried this before, claiming all sorts of nonsense as “constititional history”, and they were sent packing. The history is complicated, but it’s there. Happy reading.[/quote]
[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
<<< Markets can’t be a solution, because markets presuppose certain things outside of the market to already be in existence - and with respect to newly freed slaves, none of those pre-conditions existed. They could not avail themselves of the market - so the market couldn’t possibly remedy the problem. So, remedial legislation was necessary to help the process along. >>>[/quote]OK… This is the thing that I must admit does consistently deny me a good answer when I’ve thought deeply about this in the past. What good does it do to tell a man who’s been nearly starved to death that, oops, were sorry, the food is right over there when he hasn’t the strength to get to it now? Somebody has to carry him over there for a while until he’s healthy enough to do it himself. I get that.
[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:<<< A good, prosperous, free civilization is made up of a bunch of institutions - family, church, communities, fraternities, and yes, market and yes, state. All of these serve a role and they must all remain in balance (and within their sphere). >>>[/quote]But here is where I always end up leaping off that train. I don’t see this as possible except in a society where the moral consensus was high enough for private citizens and groups to do a better job anyway. If the government can do this without a disastrous lapse into vote buying by legislation, then the people who put them in office can do it even better and without the risk. If people really gave a damn about anybody else you wouldn’t have to force them to help. [quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:<<< I think legislation that is designed to promote transparency and information dissemination in commerce is generally good (these laws can promote commerce by reducing transaction costs and risks and potential for fraud). >>>[/quote]Ok, but why is this not just not good policy in general having nothing to do with race or social status? [quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:<<< I think legislation that looks to redistribute wealth is bad (real bad).[/quote]You already know I agree with this.[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote: I think legislation that provides welfare for those who cannot help themselves in necessary (it is always the obligation of the strong to protect the weak). I think this help should be limited and should more local. >>>[/quote]But what is this if not redistribution? What if we had say a 15% flat tax and then boxes to check for 5, 10 or 15% additional to help your fellow disadvantaged minority Americans? Or any Americans for that matter? What % of people do you really think would give any more than they have to by law? As soon as it becomes force the politicians start proclaiming how they got it for you and if you want it to continue you know how to vote and off we go and we end up where we are now.[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:<<< I decentralization in lots of areas, including both state and market functions. >>>[/quote]When all is said and done we’re back to the fact that without voluntary social conservatism this whole discussion remains meaningless.
This is from a couple weeks ago where I said the following: Here is the thing I think many people on the right are thinking, but aren’t necessarily trumpeting from the roof tops.
I’ll speak for myself.
There are some things I wouldn’t immediately mind A government doing that I certainly don’t want THIS government doing and by “this” government I don’t just mean since the last national election. In that light, given the choice between this government doing them and them not being done by government at all, I choose the latter.
A government always degenerates into THIS government once they start down this road.
But here is where I always end up leaping off that train. I don’t see this as possible except in a society where the moral consensus was high enough for private citizens and groups to do a better job anyway.
If the government can do this without a disastrous lapse into vote buying by legislation, then the people who put them in office can do it even better and without the risk. If people really gave a damn about anybody else you wouldn’t have to force them to help.[/quote]
Not sure I follow. I said the state is one of the (necessary) institutions that make up society - are you saying you don’t think a state should be one of these? That this isn’t possible - a state can’t be one of these institutions? Don’t let me misunderstand you.
Your question seemed broader than just the race/discrimination question, so I threw in the whole lot in case you were asking.
When I say “wealth redistribution”, I mean a policy of trying to level income/wealth as a matter of “fairness” - that higher amounts of wealth are presumed to be ill-gotten (to some extent) and some of that wealth needs to be taken to give to those who have less, even if the people who have less have “enough” to make a living.
Welfare for the poor is to use public resources to help people who don’t currently have the means to make a living and need assistance to make a basic minimum.
The goal is not redistribution for redistribution’s sake, nor is it designed to correct an “imbalance” or “inequality” in wealth - the goal is to make sure our fellow citizens don’t slip through the cracks by not having the basic necessities and an opportunity to find a way out of welfare.
No, I get it fine - and your choice of words (“emasculate”) continues to haunt you. The Founders wanted a stronger government, so they created one. No problem. It was created with limits. No problem. Did they want a “weak” federal government? Nope.
[/quote]
No, you don’t “get it fine.” You’re stumble-bumblin’ around trying to twist my words and intent. You are using the word “emasculate” in the sense of powerless and effeminate and thus ineffective. …Stay with the narrative, bub.[/quote]
To “emasculate” is to weaken or to reduce vigor - as in, to make something strong or adequate weaker from its original version. That ain’t what happened.
I realize you are in love with your metaphor, but the salient point is this and this only: your version of what the federal government is supposed to be about - the libertarian version - is not supported by history or the Founding Fathers. Period.
Your choice of metaphor means nothing to me on the basis that your premise is, well, wrong, no matter what metaphor you use to try explain it - the bottom line is when you say “my version of the federal government/Constitution is right, and the reason I am right is that the Founding Fathers saw it my way” is 100% false.
What libertarians need to say is “look, this is the scope I think the federal government should observe. And, this is what I think the Constitution should mean. But, though I think these things should be this way, there is pretty much no historical support for these ideas. They’re pretty new, but I think that is the way things should be.”
Where you step in it is when you start this jibberish up about how the Founders support your view. It’s rubbish, and that’s the only “narrative” that counts.
My point was the Constitution clearly and concisely laid out, enumerated, the powers of the federal government and placed the reins (of the gelding) in the hands of the states and the people. Any powers not listed belonged to the states and the people. THAT, my friend Jose, is a gelded federal government. Capable and compliant - a servant not a master.
You really want to continue to argue with me on this point, Spike? [/quote]
I am not arguing with you in the first place. This is the basic framework - and I haven’t disputed it. The problem is addressed in the next post.