Go to any site involving the Tea Party and you’ll find statements demanding our legislators “follow the Constitution,” a link to the Constitution and or calls for repeals to various amendments to the Constitution.
Yet their “leader” Jim Demit calls for banning gays and single women who are having sexual relations outside of marriage from teaching in our schools.
They call for the community center containing a Mosque in New York not to be built – although they have (finally) come to the conclusion that under our Constitution they can – because it would not be “sensitive” to Americans. Of course, they neglect to remember that 70 Muslims died in the twin towers or that many of the rescuers were also Muslims. They paint an entire religion as “terrorists.”
As Thomas Paine wrote in Common Sense, “in America the law is king.”
Apparently for Jim DeMint and his Tea Party cohorts – the law is king, only when THEY choose it to be so.
While DeMint calls the health care reform bill unconstitutional, he believes we should “keep the promise” of Medicare and Social Security.
In his own fund raising letter he wrote: “I believe the only way to take back our freedom is to return to the constitutional principles our founding fathers promised in 1776.”
Back to 1776? (Of course, the Constitution wasn’t actually written until 1787, and the first 10 Amendments weren’t ratified until 1791, but that’s another story). Let’s see what we would be missing, if we went back to the original Constitution and kept only it’s first 10 amendments.
- Eleventh Amendment (1795): Clarifies judicial power over foreign nationals, and limits ability of citizens to sue states in federal courts and under federal law. (Full text)
- Twelfth Amendment (1804): Changes the method of presidential elections so that members of the Electoral College cast separate ballots for president and vice president. (Full text)
- Thirteenth Amendment (1865): Abolishes slavery and authorizes Congress to enforce abolition. (Full text)
- Fourteenth Amendment (1868): Defines a set of guarantees for United States citizenship; prohibits states from abridging citizens’ privileges or immunities and rights to due process and the equal protection of the law; repeals the Three-fifths compromise; prohibits repudiation of the federal debt caused by the Civil War. (Full text)
- Fifteenth Amendment (1870): Prohibits the federal government and the states from using a citizen’s race, color, or previous status as a slave as a qualification for voting. (Full text)
- Sixteenth Amendment (1913): Authorizes unapportioned federal taxes on income. (Full text)
- Seventeenth Amendment (1913): Converts state election of senators to popular election. (Full text)
- Eighteenth Amendment (1919): Prohibited the manufacturing, importing, and exporting of alcoholic beverages (see Prohibition in the United States). Repealed by the Twenty-First Amendment. (Full text)
- Nineteenth Amendment (1920): Prohibits the federal government and the states from forbidding any citizen to vote due to their sex. (Full text)
- Twentieth Amendment (1933): Changes details of congressional and presidential terms and of presidential succession. (Full text)
- Twenty-first Amendment (1933): Repeals Eighteenth Amendment. Permits states to prohibit the importation of alcoholic beverages. (Full text)
- Twenty-second Amendment (1951): Limits president to two terms. (Full text)
- Twenty-third Amendment (1961): Grants presidential electors to the District of Columbia. (Full text)
- Twenty-fourth Amendment (1964): Prohibits the federal government and the states from requiring the payment of a tax as a qualification for voting for federal officials. (Full text)
- Twenty-fifth Amendment (1967): Changes details of presidential succession, provides for temporary removal of president, and provides for replacement of the vice president. (Full text)
- Twenty-sixth Amendment (1971): Prohibits the federal government and the states from forbidding any citizen of age 18 or greater to vote on account of their age. (Full text)
- Twenty-seventh Amendment (1992): Limits congressional pay raises. (Full text)
And then, of course, we have DeMint’s protégé, Christine O’Donnell, who has no concept, of how we get to separation of church and state beginning with the Constitution and the Supreme Court decisions confirming it.
It is beyond frightening these people are running for office and that some of them may even be elected when they haven’t even a rudimentary concept of the Constitution or how government works.
“demint– ed’ that’s good!
on maddow last night, we had a review of the tea party candidates and their problems with the constitution. (reminded me of “true believers” and their problems with the bible”.)
sharron angle, though has to take the prize, with her declaration about how to use the constitution, which in my view takes it to its ultimate distortion
“if we don’t win, we’ll have to use ‘second amendment remedies’,”
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We’ll see what happens after Nov 2 – as much as they have ginned up the crazies, it wouldn’t surprise me. Rush will be apoplectic if they come up short – THAT would be something to see.
We can only hope!!!!!
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Let me start by complaining about this editor. It gives so little view-area and control that it is hard to see when you’ve made a mistake. There is a Project GNU patch-in that allows you to set the OpenOffice editor as the functional editor for a website. This is not an area of expertise for me, but a real, full-screen editor would really help!
The Watergate aftermath legislation was the first “campaign finance reform” effort that I remember. A friend of mind made the point that the effect of this was to limit the independence of candidates and give more control to the financial underwriters of the parties. Four decades of experience has demonstrated the validity of this assertion. Add to this the domination of our (once regulated) monopolies on dissemination of information and we have a perfect storm for the development of an ignorant electorate.
The problem is the level of ignorance developed and maintained in the general public.with respect to the fundamentals of socio-political interactions. Who today remembers that the opening of the Ohio River valley to expansion came not from “free enterprise” but rather a very large investment made by our government in canals and roads? Who today remembers that the then revolting colonies gave permanent exemption from taxes to E.I. duPont de Nemours so that we could “import” French gun (“black”) powder manufacturing technology?
The TEA Party movement is based on the anger felt by average Americans at having their standard of living destroyed. The “problem” is that those enthralled by the TEA Party have not realized that those who stole the standard of living are using them to continue and accelerate that theft! When they (rank and file TEA Party) complain about “death panels,” they are woefully (and carefully maintained) ignorant of the facts regarding corporate “avoidance” of claims paying.
50% of all “compensation” paid today in America goes to (depending on who’s numbers you are willing to believe) between 1.75% and 3% of those being “compensated.” More importantly, the “wealth” that pays that “compensation” derives today from the (approximately) 65% of our “economy” made up by trading pieces of paper back and forth. While it is true that the basis of the mercantile economy in existence when America was founded could be attributed to moving “worthless” (or nearly so) materials from the point of excess to some place where they had “worth,” we have left such “activities” to our national competitors and focused instead on merely exchanging theoretical ownership back and forth! Where are those asking what is wrong with this picture?
There is an evolution to things. Back in the latter days of the war in Vietnam, there was a bolt used to retain blades on the Huey helicopter that was a really nice bolt to use to hold the heads on a particular (and lusted after) V8 engine. So many of these bolts were taken out of military warehouses and placed on such engines that we could not get Huey’s into the air when required. The “solution” was to order every bolt in military stock to be individually serial numbered and blister packed. The price of a military grade bolt leaped from $0.05 to $1.65 in the space of three months — and the “problem” was not “solved.” This is indicative of most of the “solutions” we have seen put in place over the last four decades.
There needs to be a channel for analysis and proposition of “fixes” that takes reality into account. I work in industry. The fact is that as our population has increased, the number of people needed to accomplish tasks has reduced. Jobs that required 500 people to accomplish fifty years ago are routinely done by fewer than 20 people today. It does not matter where you look, these types of ratios are obvious — yet we still pursue the “goal” of “full employment.” What is wrong with this picture.
I was working with some people from the U.W. College of Medicine back in 2004. They told me (and this appears to be true, I just can’t nail it down for sure) that we graduated numerically fewer MD’s in 2004 than we did in 1964. The population of America has increased by (about) 300% over that period, but the number of doctors we have added to that part of the workforce has declined. Where are those asking what is wrong with this picture?
Lew, a programmer I am not. I’ve gone through dozens of WordPress Plug-Ins and cannot find a full screen editor. You might try creating your post in Word or something similar and then copying it to the comment box?
If you know of something that I haven’t found (it could be out there, I just didn’t find it), please let me know.