DO AMERICANS REALLY BELIEVE IN THE CONSTITUTION?

Many politicians and other Americans claim to believe in the Constitution of the United States. But, do they really believe in the Constitution or, are they only hiding behind pseudo-patriotic rhetoric while in reality promoting a selfish anti-American agenda?

The Preamble to the Constitution definitively addresses the intent and purpose of the document. Thus, in order to interpret the Constitution correctly, we must first and foremost consider what the Preamble states:

“We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity. . .”

The first thing we learn from the Preamble is that “we the people” are the government. Not surprisingly, Americans who claim to stand for “smaller” government generally back an agenda that appeases a minority and is harmful to the majority of we the people.

The second thing we learn is the Constitution’s authors didn’t believe they were creating a perfect government. Rather, they wanted it to be “more perfect”, better than previous governments. Far too many Americans oppose wise policies because they aren’t perfect, which policies created by imperfect people never will be.

The next purpose stated in the Preamble is to “establish justice”. Many Americans support unjust policies that are against the human and civil rights of minority, working class, poor and other citizens. Many support policies denying American workers and others the right to freely organize and demonstrate against injustice.

The fourth purpose the Preamble states is to “insure domestic Tranquility”. The word “gun” doesn’t appear anywhere in the Constitution. Is it insuring domestic tranquility to allow every Tom, Dick and Harriet to own as many “Arms” as they wish, which today include machine guns, tanks, biological weapons and nuclear bombs?

Next we find “to provide for the common defense”. Defense is just one of several stated purposes of the Constitution, yet many politicians and other Americans today act as if this is the only purpose of government, ignoring the rest of what the document clearly states.

The Preamble then says to “promote the general Welfare”. Yet many Americans oppose universal health care, affordable housing, job programs, infrastructure rebuilding and many other things clearly needed for the general welfare of ourselves and future generations.

Don’t Americans realize that people without adequate nutrition, shelter and health care more easily become ill and spread contagious diseases? Don’t we realize children without a strong educational and moral foundation become our society’s burdens of tomorrow? Don’t we realize unjust policies indiscriminately harm everyone, including ourselves and our own children?

The Preamble says the purpose of the Constitution is to “secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity”. Why do so many Americans oppose environmental and other legislation desperately needed to secure the blessings of liberty for our ourselves, our children and our children’s children?

Do Americans really believe in the Constitution? You Decide.

Link to footnotes and documentation for this article

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DOES THE NRA DEFEND THE 2ND AMENDMENT?

According to the 2nd Amendment of the United States Constitution,
“. . .the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed”.  The word “Arms” was deliberately capitalized, a common practice at the time used for emphasis.  Since Thomas Jefferson later owned a private cannon, the largest weapon in his day, the term “Arms” to the original framers clearly meant more than small arms one can easily “bear”; note, to “keep” and bear Arms.

The word “gun” is found nowhere in the Constitution, a very carefully worded document.  It should also be noted that in the Consitution’s pre-amble, one of the main purposes listed is to “insure domestic Tranquility” (also capitalized).  To honestly and correctly interpret the intentions of the framers, everything that follows the Preamble, including all ten original amendments soon added, must be viewed in light of the Constitution’s stated purpose.

For many years, the NRA has been guilty of drawing a non-existent, artificial line down the center of the 2nd Amendment, limiting the debate to guns, knives, grenades and similar small arms.  To contend that the 2nd Amendment permits unlimited unregulated private ownership of modern assault weapons, is no more Constitutionally rational than to pretend that the 2nd Amendment allows unlimited private ownership of chemical weapons, nuclear bombs and space-ray weapons, which are also modern “Arms” unknown to the framers.

In order to engage in an honest Constitutional debate, the NRA must admit that, according to their interpretation of the 2nd Amendment, we have just as much right to own private nuclear bombs and Anthrax as we do to own a multi-round handgun, none of which existed when the 2nd Amendment was drafted.  If we wish to have a society at all, then the 21st Century question is not “if” we are going to restrict the NRA’s interpretation of the 2nd Amendment but rather, in what manner are we going to restrict it.

For the record, if any living Americans have the right to argue in favor of restricting the 2nd Amendment, it is Jim and Sarah Brady.  And, as the “founding fathers” wisely allowed for, we can always amend what they originally wrote down.  A perhaps better and much saner idea would be to amend the NRA, entirely and altogether, by forcing our reluctant media to point out their deceptive and entirely irrational position.

The NRA has no more rational or Constitutional right to limit the 2nd Amendment to an issue of small Arms ownership than the ACLU has a right to restrict the 1st Amendment to their Constitutionally, historically and scientifically irrational interpretation of the known evidence. Perhaps Thomas Jefferson’s re-write of the New Testament, while he was a sitting president, would today include the following wry observation:  If conservatives and liberals crawl into a similar dark bed of deception, they will likely both end up in the same bottomless black hole, accordingly.

Does the NRA really defend the 2nd Amendment?  You decide.

Link to footnotes and documentation for the above article.

WHO IS REALLY KIDDING WHO?

Claims by politicians that raising taxes on the wealthy will cause job losses and hurt small business are completely untrue.  During the Eisenhower and Kennedy years, when upper-income tax brackets reached as high as 91%, the majority of working and middle-class American families enjoyed a quality lifestyle on a single wage-earner income.  Almost nobody lacked health care and homelessness was virtually unheard of.

Anyone who has owned a small business knows that the entire “Joe the Plummer” charade is just one great big lie.  Few plumbers or owners of small privately-held companies in America earn a net taxable income over $250,000 per year.  Most of them are much smarter than that, re-investing excess profits to grow their business and otherwise, to avoid paying taxes. 

The higher people are taxed on excess income, whether or not they own a business, the more incentive they have to invest that income back into what will grow the economy and increase jobs.  Raising taxes on net taxable income above $250,000, as President Obama proposed, would serve to increase jobs and stimulate the economy, the exact opposite of what bought-and-paid-for politicians and right-wing media hacks pretend is true. 

If Medicare was expanded into a single-payer universal system, health care could be paid for by taxing everyone the same percentage rate above the poverty level. This would greatly stimulate the economy by removing a huge financial burden off employers.  It would eliminate employee wage taxes for Medicare and Medicaid and the significant cost of employer-provided health coverage.

Because income up to the poverty level would be exempt, it would cost the poor almost nothing to have quality health care.  And, it would cost the working and middle-classes considerably less than they pay now, when lower costs for goods and services are factored in, along with the elimination of the mega-bite of at least 25 cents that insurance and other unnecessary industry components take from every health care dollar. 

There is no rational argument when weighing the current U.S. patchwork health care fiasco against the universal health systems of France, Germany, Japan and Sweden.  Average income citizens in these nations receive much better care and, the cost to insure everyone is 10% or less of their GNP.  The cost to Americans is a staggering 15% of GNP and, this much greater cost still leaves almost half with inadequate care and one out of six Americans with no health care at all.

When taxes are lowered on the wealthy, as they have consistently been from Ronald Reagan forward, everybody eventually loses, including the wealthy.  The poor, working and middle classes reach a point where they can no longer afford to purchase goods and services.  This is clearly seen today, in blocks of houses sitting empty, banks and mortgage companies failing, auto dealerships and major stores closing down and many areas with double-digit unemployment.
 
Is “Joe the Plumber” just a scam?  Is the entire Demo/Publican 2-party system just a scam?  Who is really scamming who?  You decide.

Link to footnotes and documentation for this article:
http://www.freedomtracks.com/500/scam.html