Guest post by Camillus
Camillus, a former Republican Party officer in his home state in the Northeastern United States who was involved in campaigns at both the local, state, and federal levels during the 2010 elections.
Disclaimer: All guest posts are the opinion of the poster and do not necessarily represent the views of moonhowlings.net administration. M-H
“Restore the Constitution!” It’s a cry, in various iterations, that one commonly hears from the Tea Party. There have been “Restore the Constitution” rallies calling for “restoring the rule of law,” there are “Restore the Constitution” petitions circulating online, and there are “Restore the Constitution” blog sites. Politically, the Tea Party movement portrays itself as the defenders of the Constitution keeping faith with the original intent of the Founding Fathers.
This is ironic. A deeper examination of positions held by the Tea Party, particularly regarding the scope of the 10th Amendment, the repeal or modification of the 14th, 16th, and 17th Amendments, and the support for various nullification proposals, reflects a hostility to aspects of the Constitution as well as opposition to well-established principles in our Constitutional jurisprudence. In the end, the vision of our Constitution expressed by the Tea Party movement is often fundamentally at odds with that of many of our leading Founders, including Washington, Adams, Hamilton, Jay, Marshall, and Madison (prior to his 1791 break with Hamilton).
A telling omission: The Tea Party and the 10th Amendment
The 10th Amendment features prominently in the Constitutionalism of the Tea Party. It provides that: “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.” To the Tea Party, the 10th Amendment is a forgotten (or ignored) restriction limiting the powers of the federal government to those explicitly enumerated in the Constitution. What is actually ignored is the history of the 10th Amendment. During the debates in Congress over what ultimately became the Bill of Rights, James Madison successfully defeated a motion to add the word “expressly”- as in “the powers not expressly delegated”- to the 10th Amendment, because, in his words, “it [is] impossible to confine a Government to the exercise of express powers; there must necessarily be admitted powers by implication.” Ignoring Madison’s logic, the Tea Party would write the word “expressly” back into the 10th Amendment though its narrow interpretation.
The Tea Party’s vision of the 10th Amendment also ignores the jurisprudential legacy of one of our earliest, and most consequential, Chief Justices- John Marshall. According to public television reporter Chris Satullo, “John Marshall, as much as any man save for the great James Madison, determined what our founding charter really meant, and did so in ways that enabled the American experiment to thrive.” In this regard, note that “thriving” is inextricably intertwined with a vigorous and capable federal government.
Fundamentally, Marshall:
“[I]interpreted the Constitution in a way opposite to the Tea Partiers and libertarians who now cite the 10th Amendment as cause to roll back the clock to 1850.
Marshall led the Supreme Court over 34 years, deciding the key cases that established the court as an equal branch and shaped the role of the federal government.
One of those cases is McCulloch v. Maryland. Apparently the Tea Partiers now carrying on about the 10th Amendment never heard of McCulloch or think it wrongly decided…
Tea Partiers today insist, following their hero Jefferson (no fan of the Constitution), that this clause limits Congress and the President only to those powers specifically named. They would have our leaders hamstrung in the face of any event not anticipated in 1787. They would declare illegal most of modern government, from the Tennessee Valley Authority to Social Security to the EPA.
But Marshall decided McCulloch, the great test of this question, in precisely the opposite way, establishing that the federal government has implicit powers to “ensure the general welfare”…
In the end, as one legal scholar has concluded, the Tea Party’s narrow reading of the 10th Amendment “is without support in [its] legislative history or [in] Supreme Court” precedent.
“Constitutional graffiti”
At the same time, some Congressional Republicans, including Tea Party darling Michele Bachmann, have been busy proposing a veritable blizzard of Constitutional edits and fixes. These include: repeal of the 17th Amendment (ending the direct election of Senators), amending the 14th Amendment (to end birthright citizenship), a prohibition on government ownership of private corporate stock, a “Parental Rights Amendment,” various proposed term-limits amendments, an amendment prohibiting flag burning, various balanced-budget amendments, a national prohibition on gay marriage, an amendment requiring a supermajority vote for any tax increases, and an amendment restricting the President’s authority to negotiate treaties. Reaching back to the antebellum “nullification” debates, Rep. Eric Cantor (R-VA), has even called for a “Repeal Amendment” which would provide for the nullification of federal laws by a two-thirds majority of the states, and there have been other calls for “nullification” as well.
Other Tea Party candidates weighed in offering their own Constitutional tweaks during the election campaign. For example, Joe Miller in Alaska announced that unemployment benefits were unconstitutional (despite the fact that he formerly received them), while Rand Paul said the same thing about the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Meanwhile, both Glen Beck (“the most highly regarded individual among Tea Party supporters,” according to one recent poll by Democracy Corps- he is viewed as an “educator”) and Sharron Angle have called for the repeal of the 16th Amendment (which established the federal income tax).
The movements to repeal or amend the 14th, 16th, and 17th Amendments, and the ghoulish return of “nullification” from its Civil War-era grave, warrant further analysis, as they illuminate the populist/libertarian assault on the Constitution, and federal authority, presently underway.
The Tea Party has become the political home of modern nativism. This finds expression in calls for the modification of the 14th Amendment to eliminate birthright citizenship. The 14th Amendment is a legacy of the Civil War and Reconstruction. It plainly states that anyone born in the United States is a citizen, and entitled to the equal protection of the law: “All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.” The Tea Party would strike from the Constitution one of the most seminal statements elucidating the concept of human freedom ever written in the history of the world. The movement to amend the 14th Amendment is an ominous harbinger of other dangers ahead.
Calls for the repeal of the 16th Amendment are particularly reckless and irresponsible. The 16th Amendment, ratified in 1913, gives Congress the “power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived . . . .” The power to tax, however, was not a 20th Century addition to the Constitution- Article I, Section 8 vests Congress with the “[p]ower to lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States . . .” Given this clear language, one might ask, why was the 16th Amendment needed? The answer is simple- it was necessary in order to reverse a Supreme Court decision, Pollock v. Farmers’ Loan & Trust Co., holding that the federal income tax was unconstitutional. The Pollock case is significant in that the Court broke with its own prior precedent affirming the constitutionality of the federal income tax, such as Springer v. United States (an 1889 case upholding the Constitutionality of a federal income tax), and ignored the clear language of Article I, Section 8.
While the level of the federal income tax, and its structure, is open to debate, there can be no dispute that it was an essential element in the creation of a stronger America. And that was an essential predicate to America’s world-saving role in the 20th Century- both from the spectre of Nazism, and from Communist tyranny. Those who would gut our national power, like Glen Beck and Sharron Angle, either imagine that similar dangers will never arise in the future, or worse, simply do not care. If the Tea Party succeeds in stripping Congress of its power to tax income, how will the federal government fulfill its Constitutional mandate to “provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States . . . .”?
The 17th Amendment provides for the direct election of United States Senators. Under the original Constitution, they were appointed directly by state legislatures. Like the 16th Amendment, it was also ratified in 1913. Astonishingly, its repeal has become a favorite cause of Tea Party candidates across America. For example, speaking in July, Rep. Paul Broun (R-GA) informed a Tea Party crowd that the 16th (the federal income tax) and 17th Amendments began the “process of socializing America,” and that both should be repealed. Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah), Rep. Jeff Landry (R-LA), and Rep. Raul Labrador (R-ID), also expressed support for repealing the 17th Amendment during the election campaign (in an ironic twist illuminating the subject of this article, Sen. Lee’s web page features the slogan “Join us in restoring Constitutional government to Washington!”).
The direct election of Senators by the people might sound innocuous, but in the view of the Tea Party, it’s ratification “dealt a blow to the Framers’ vision of the Constitution from which we have yet to recover.” In the view of the Tea Party, repealing it would enhance “states’ rights.” This puts the Tea Party in the awkward position of arguing that democracy isn’t a good thing. It also illuminates the real motivation in play- weakening the federal government, weakening the Union, and empowering State governments- which is separate and distinct from empowering citizens. To illustrate this point, consider: is it better to have United States Senators representing your state legislature, or representing you?
The sweet smell of Magnolias is discernable in much of the Tea Party’s Constitutionalism. This is particularly true in the calls for state nullification, largely centered on objections to “Obamacare.” Nullification, of course, was a doctrine conjured up and utilized by leaders in the South in the antebellum period. It has essentially laid dormant in its grave since the end of the Civil War (except for a brief dusting off during the Civil Rights era) but has now arisen, zombie-like, to haunt the political landscape again.
An entire essay could be written on the pernicious and destructive nature of nullification. For present purposes, it is enough to say that (to paraphrase Lincoln), it is in many ways the essence of anarchy. It utterly destroys federal authority, and is more appropriate for a confederation of independent states than a union (smell the Magnolias again?). If it were ever adopted, it would mean that there would be no uniform national law- different federal laws would be enforced in different states. Thus, it is a step towards Balkanization- towards eventual disunion.
It is also fundamentally antithetical to the Constitution of the Founders- indeed, it is a direct assault upon it. Article VI of the Constitution, after all, provides that “[t]his Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof, and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States and of the several states, shall be the Supreme Law of the Land, and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding.” In the end, it is one thing to argue that an act of Congress is unconstitutional, but another thing entirely to arge that States have the authority to nullify otherwise constitutional acts of Congress. And the Tea Party seems to be taking the latter approach.
An objective observer would call all of this “re-writing,” not “restoring.” And there is no remotely comparable activity occuring on the political left. As one author has noted, “the self-proclaimed party of conservatism has become a constitutional graffiti movement.”
Our modern Anti-Federalists
In its attempt to portray itself as the defenders of the Constitution, the Tea Party appropriates the legacy of the Founding Fathers. However, the Federalist Papers, and the actions of Washington, Hamilton, Adams, and Marshall in office, reflect a rather different view of federalism and the nature of the Constitutional compact. That’s not surprising. They knew that the Constitution created a strong national government- indeed, that was the point of the entire process of calling the Constitutional convention in Philadelphia in the first place. Such a vision is fundamentally at odds with reading the 10th Amendment as a veritable straight jacket restricting national power, with support for Cantor’s Repeal Amendment and state “nullification” laws, or with repealing the 16th Amendment.
Indeed, a common thread running through much of the Tea Party’s view of the Constitution is a desire to eviscerate the power of the federal government. In their dogmatic opposition to a vigorous central governing authority, the Tea Party actually voices views similar to those expressed by opponents of the Constitution during the ratification debates. They are the modern heirs of the Anti-Federalists, and not of the Founders. And that’s problematic, because if the Anti-Federalists had prevailed in the early years of the Republic, it is unlikely America would have grown into the prosperous, free, powerful, and united nation spanning an entire continent that it ultimately became… or perhaps, even survived.
“Facts are stubborn things”
These facts frame what the Tea Party means by “Restore the Constitution.” They do not mean the document that we have actually had during the course of our history. They do not mean the document we have lived with for the past two hundred years- the one that helped our nation achieve hitherto unprecedented levels of prosperity and freedom. And however loudly they may say they love the Constitution and the Founders, the truth is that they would amend or repeal crucial elements of it, effectively jettison more then two centuries’ of jurisprudence, and redefine federalism in a way that reverses the outcome of the Constitutional ratification debates, and even of the Civil War.
In the end, I don’t think it’s the Constitution that the Tea Party wants to restore; it’s the Articles of Confederation.
Camillus is a former Republican Party officer who was involved in campaigns at both the local, state, and federal levels during the 2010 elections.
i give up, maybe she’s right. i’ll sign up for my party card and vote for the great leader; hopefully he’ll take care of me when the day comes
@Pat.Herve I was talking about the surgery, not the flight. So my vigorous 87-year-old mother-in-law gets told her procedure would not be cost-effective because of her age,” while our Congresspeople who voted for this shit get the best care the nation has to offer, regardless of outcome. That is the point. And you’re good with that?
e, I don’t think she (Elena) is pushing a party. I think she is saying there needs to be health care reform and there needs to be equal laws regarding abortion.
Emma, but Ted Kennedy would have gotten that care regardless. He would just write a check and never miss the money.
I am not sure that NHC rations because of age. How do you know that will happen?
Some folks are equally pro life at the other end of the spectrum as they are at the beginning. I am one of those who would like to have a say so when I check out. Not everyone feels that way. That is why I should have the option.
@Moon-howler I don’t know that will happen. I would hope the people who voted for it would know, had they bothered to read it. But then, again, they are exempt, so what do they care how it will impact them or their families? That’s for us small people to worry about. And that is fundamentally why I object to this sort of governmental overreach.
MH and Emma, in response to the healthcare exemption I pulled this for y’all.
http://politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2010/mar/26/tom-coburn/health-bill-appears-exempt-some-congressional-staf/
I’m rushing out the door but hope that helps and I don’t confuse things!
Yes, I am right and yes you should give up 😉
I hope you are home and celebrating New Years with your special someone.
Emma,
How do you reconcile this fact http://www.factcheck.org/2010/01/congress-exempt-from-health-bill/ with what you are suggesting regarding members of congress are exempt from health care reform. I wasn’t really sure what you were suggesting anyway.
Government workers have great health care, why would they want to be exempt? Exempt from what, having to buy insurance?
You really ought to read this fact check that states:
Q: Does the health care bill specifically exempt members of Congress and their staffs from its provisions?
A: No. This twisted claim is based on misrepresentations of the House and Senate bills, neither of which exempts lawmakers.
We’ve received many questions about claims that House and Senate members would be exempt from the health care legislation taking shape in Congress. But neither the House nor the Senate bill exempts Congress from its provisions.
Members of Congress are subject to the legislation’s mandate to have insurance, and the plans available to them must meet the same minimum benefit standards that other insurance plans will have to meet. “All plans would have to follow those requirements by 2019,” Aaron Albright, press secretary for the House Committee on Education and Labor, told FactCheck.org. “People actually believe we wrote in the bill that Congress exempts itself from these requirements. That falsehood has been going around since the very beginning.”
How did the notion of an “exemption” get started? So far as we can find, the first to make the “exempt” claim was columnist John Fund, who used the word in a June Wall Street Journal opinion piece to describe a draft of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee bill. Fund wrote that the proposal “would specifically exempt Members of Congress from many of [the Obama plan’s] provisions.” But that was a misrepresentation.
@George S. Harris
Of course I can have it “both ways.” My government health care is part of my contract. However, I have the OPTION of care, possibly better, elsewhere. Its my experience with government health care that makes me resist ObamaCare. Senator McCain had a good idea. He was proposing that we open up VA care to the private market, with either gov’t payments or vouchers, in addition to the VA.
I don’t want our entire medical industry to be dependent on government largess. I don’t want medical treatment to be subject of the vagaries of political connections. I don’t want the rest of the country to be forced to rely on just one source of medical resources. And I believe that free citizens should not be forced to buy a product from a third party because of government mandate.
@Cargo,
So what would you do about medicare?
Cargo,
What exactly are you talking about? What “one government source” are referencing? How do you feel about car insurance, home owners insurance? With those you have a choice to own a car or a house, you DO NOT Have a choice to “own” a body. When people get sick they WILL seek care, no question, no one WANTS to die if they can be saved, it’s a basic human instinct.
Do you believe that people without heatlh insurance, if they can’t pay, should die? Because that would be the only way to stop the detrimental effect on the rising cost of medical care due to non payment issues or long term delays in payment.
We all pay for people without health insurance. We pay as far as our tax dollars and we pay on our premiums. We just get charged more at hospitals. When people walk on their hospital bills, everyone eventually pays.
[…] Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for East Asia David Sedney On the same subject: https://www.moonhowlings.net/index.php/2010/12/29/restore-the-constitution/ […]
give me a break…… Look, Obama has nothing to do with “death panels.” Jan Brewer, republican governor for AZ is the only one creating death panels right now with her refusal to allow some of our fellow citizens to receive life saving transplants. In any event, Socialism is not a bad word. Fascism, on the other hand , is. And I do agree we are running out of hope. We are no longer a capitalistic society. We are technically an oligarchy and a corporatocracy. When we remove money from politics, that’s when we will be Utilitarian again. The problem is that the “republicans” of the last 40 years are not really conservatives in the true sense of the word. I happen to have a strong respect and agreement with true conservatives and I am a liberal. We are in the middle of a true paridigm shift in this country and it will get uglier. Hopefully we all will realize that the danger is from corporate control of our leaders which is what our forefathers all the way up to FDR and Eisenhower specifically warned us about. Just as an aside, E, don’t use Wikipedia as a reference. It’s not very respected in academic worlds nor is it considered completely accurate.
Sorry, E, but your logic is twisted.” Obamacare~women not having control of our bodies??? Are you kidding? I want you to explain what exactly you think”Obama care” is? Give me a specific definition with examples. You sound like Fox news for God’s sake… If you don’t believe in abortion, great, don’t have one, and don’t get anyone pregnant. Otherwise, shutup and stay out of my womb. If you want to help, go adopt a child that’s not wanted.Good grief.
socialism is a bad word. socialism creates an environment where people do not look within themselves for inspiration, but rather, look for a nanny state to take care of them. there are various degrees of this dependency mentality, just like there are degrees of fascism and totalitarianism.
in regards to wikipedia, i know it’s not accurate because every leftie like hugo chavez gets idolized like the second coming of christ, whereas conservatives like limbaugh get trashed and every controversy in his life is delved into with a finetoothed comb. nevertheless, wikipedia is still a good source of info for general matters
i do remember obama saying that if 94 year old granny needs an operation, she’d be better off just taking a pain pill, so obama=death panels is very much in the minds of many americans
removing money from politics is not the solution, removing government from our money is! unfortunately the true paradigm shift this country is experiencing is that the government is sinking its teeth deeper and deeper into every facet of our lives and finances, and the country is broke. when municipalities and then states start going belly up and are unable to cough up funds for bloated union retirement and healthcare funds, watch for riots in the streets and then it will really get ugly.
it’s time to get back to our country’s roots of conservative fiscal policy and small government; that’s what the tea party is all about. unfortunately we’re probably already past the point of no return, so hang on it’s about to get very bumpy
Senator McCain had a good idea. He was proposing that we open up VA care to the private market, with either gov’t payments or vouchers, in addition to the VA.
I don’t want our entire medical industry to be dependent on government largess. I don’t want medical treatment to be subject of the vagaries of political connections. I don’t want the rest of the country to be forced to rely on just one source of medical resources.
Yea, that’s a great idea. Why don’t we privatize the VA like we do our 401K’s? That went really well during the crash, right.? For everyone who doesn’t know, when Republicans convinced everyone to go from a pension system to a 401k, it effectively creates a loss of 20% of your lifetime income. That 15-20%, that YOU would have kept upon retirement, went to pay wallstreet ( your brokers that handle your 401k) for their”management fees”. In other countries right now, people are up in arms because the citizens who refused 401ks can retire with 20% more money than their counterparts who chose the 401k systems. We all need to start questioning the premises we are given instead of buying the crappy explanations they sell us . Privatization is not the answer. I could list you all the areas that have been destroyed in the past 40 years due to privatization but I am weary of this whole argument. Just one good example is the Media. Regulations used to be in place that kept diversity in the media and radio market. When the FCC deregulated it ( with republican votes I might add) We have seen our news be controlled by only 6 major corporations, which has left us with entertainment news and no real in depth news. Why was the Glass-steagall act abolished ? http://topics.nytimes.com/topics/reference/timestopics/subjects/g/glass_steagall_act_1933/index.html What do you think allowed for the markets to become so corrupt and crash, destroying all of us. Government regulations after the depression were put there for a reason. Read your history. The past 40 years of deregulation and “Republican” ideas of privatization have failed. I’m sorry, but it’s true
i’m not interested in anyone’s womb, i’m just wondering why the baby in the womb has no right to live simply because it’s residing inside its mother? does that mean that as soon as it is ejected from the womb it is immediately conferred the right of a human to life? or can a hole still be drilled into its head because the placenta has not yet been cut and it’s still considered an extension of its mother? without resorting to namecalling i would like an answer
if all the money you have poured into social security would have gone into a private 401k, you’d still end up with a far, far better return to what social security is paying out, even after taking the recent 15-20% into account. furthermore, why should i be forced to pay into a system i don’t want to? what’s the difference between that and indentured servitude? also, the government is under no legal obligation to give me a dime back, it can pass a law tomorrow if it so pleases that decrees just that.
also, government regulation after the depression didn’t help at all. the depression lingered on for years despite fdr’s manipulations of the free market. what got america out of the great depression was world war two. stock markets didn’t return to their precrash levels until the 1950s
I’m sorry E, but it’s clear you have been absorbed by the BORG. Oh, I mean Limbaugh and Fox news. there’s really not much to say to someone in your frame of mind unfortunately. The only thing I can recommend is that you actually look for LINKTV if you have cable and start watching it. http://www.linktv.org/ It is not democrat or republican news, its just REAL news and documentaries. And please, find the actual quote in a respectable journalistic source and paste it here about Obama saying a 94 year old granny should take a pill. I really want to see that!!!!
and in regards to the media: there used to be only 3 or 4 channels on the telly and now you have a gazillion cable channels to choose from, not to mention the internet, talk radio, and a million other venues. why this concern over who owns what? the media is market driven. if there is a market for a food channel on cable tv, then one will be created. if there is no market for a national liberal talk radio channel, then market forces will determine that air america will fail. there is no conspiracy here.
ultimately, i place my confidence in the free exchange of ideas and capital, and value the pursuit of entrepreneurship and liberty. government is there to protect us keep us safe get out of the way and let us pursue the american dream
obama says take the pill
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U-dQfb8WQvo
E- please read this article. It explains specifically how 401ks are a scam and fraud. http://www.economicpopulist.org/content/401k-scam I can’t remember which country it is right now where workers who had a 401k the past 30 years are now in their 70’s and who’s benefits are 20% lower than their counterparts who kept regular pensions, you wil have to research it. I think it is Brazil. There is an uprising going on right now. The war did he;p lift us out of the depression, but FDR’s new deal was what created the middle class. go read some books on it please. I don’t have the time to keep correcting your misperceptions. Sorry. I have to go deal with real life issues like housecleaning and checking on my youngest kid.
E:and in regards to the media: there used to be only 3 or 4 channels on the telly and now you have a gazillion cable channels to choose from, not to mention the internet, talk radio, and a million other venues.
Those “Gazillion channels, specifically news are owned by only 6 broacast corporations, including Murdoch. what news you are allowed to hear is decided by corporate owners, NOT the actual newsroom editors. There are numerous court cases brought where reporters have been told they cannot report on newsworthy stories because it would piss off corporations. Jesus, go do some research please.
i place no confidence in 401 k’s because i know that when this country goes over the abyss, the government will seize the 401 k’s and private pensions in a last ditch desperate effort to pay its bills. i believe that’s what happened in argentina
sorry, all fdr’s new deal created was dependency on government, which is the ultimate goal of all democrats’ fiscal agendas: grow government and expand the welfare rolls so increasingly larger numbers of americans are dependent on government for their subsistence. the latest example of this trend is the unemployment benefits which are now good for 99 weeks, and there was discussion of lengthening the process even more. who ever heard of 99 weeks of unemployment? this is unheard of in our country’s history, but it is, in fact, a way of life in some european socialist (there’s that s word again) countries, with their perennial 10% unemployment rate, a rate which until very recently was unheard of here, but sadly thanks to obamanomics is the new norm here too
your “proof”is ridiculous. He is not saying she should die, he was saying that sometimes, especially with older or seriously ill people, more is not better. He was saying a doctor might recommend medication instead of surgery. I used to work as a CNA and took care of chronically or terminally ill people. alot of times we overdo it with unnecessary surgeries or interventions and we actually create more damage because we are afraid of death and dying. Doctors sometimes do unnecessary tests or procedures because they either are afraid of liability or aren’t willing to concede that the time to do more is over. In the end, although this is NOT the reason to NOT treat people , it does create a lot of financial waste in the system. I have personal experience with this. Your Youtube example is not an example of anything.
sorry, i dont buy it. if i want liberal news, i can go to msnbc. conservative, fox news. of course the bosses have the final say, that’s how it goes in every business, whether it be media or a manufacturing plant for bicycles
And no, this is NOT what happened in Argentina. They discussed it on NPR (natinal public Radio) It is what I explained. It had absolutely nothing to do with the government taking peoples pensions.
I am leaving now. I cannot continue to explain anything to someone who thinks that the New Deal didn’t lift poor disabled, and elderly people out of despair and give the middle class and GI’s the opportunity to go to college and have a decent life. I GIVE UP! Go watch LINKTV> Maybe it’ll starighten out your belief system. Boy oh Boy.
it is none of the president of the united states’s business to tell me how take care of my grandma. my healthcare and the healthcare of my family is none of his business, or the business of any other elected official. my healthcare is none of his responsibility, and it is telling of the sad state of affairs that our country has arrived at that people look to the president for advice or his position in regards to this matter
argentina seizes pension funds
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/finance/ambroseevans-pritchard/5504137/Argentina_seizes_pension_funds_to_pay_debts_Whos_next/
Argentina to seize pension funds, markets tank
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSN2128838220081021
Just as a last response to your negative “socialist countries” comment: Here is a link to Forbes’ ( conservative enough for you I assume) news article on j=how much happier people are in your scary socialist countries: http://www.forbes.com/2009/05/05/world-happiest-places-lifestyle-travel-world-happiest.html
i’m glad they’re happy. good for them
The Daily Telegraph has been politically conservative in modern times.[27] The personal links between the paper’s editors and the leadership of the Conservative Party, along with the paper’s influence over Conservative activists, has resulted in the paper commonly being referred to, especially in Private Eye, as the Torygraph.[27] Even when Conservative support was shown to have slumped in the opinion polls and Labour became ascendant in them (particularly when leader Tony Blair rebranded the party as “New Labour” on becoming leader after the death of John Smith in 1994), the newspaper remained loyal to the Conservatives. This loyalty continued after Labour ousted the Conservatives from power by a landslide election result in 1997, and in the face of Labour election wins in 2001 and the third successive Labour election win in 2005.
This proves my argument. The news you watch or read is what you believe. Unless you see or hear news with as little opinion in it ( which is hard to find, thus the reason I referred you to LINKTV) you will believe what you THINK are the facts. I don’t think it was
Argentina, but since you picked that one, if you continue to read on, the reason the government took over was because the market that they base the 401k on was about to “default.” I think it was Brazil but I can’t remember. Anyway, anytime you put a profit margin into healthcare or pensions or anything else that human beings MUST have, you end up with the kind of messes we have. End of conversation. When you are older and need these services you will not sound so confident E.
you need food just as badly as healthcare, does that mean that you can’t have a profit margin in the food industry?
and i’m sure obama will find some excuse to take over the 401k’s here, too. reichstag fire anyone?
Again, I guess it’s hard to read more than one caption line during one reading. Excerpts from conservative website, Forbes: Where in the world do people feel most content with their lives?
According to a new report released by the Organization for Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD), a Paris-based group of 30 countries with democratic governments that provides economic and social statistics and data, happiness levels are highest in northern European countries.
Denmark, Finland and the Netherlands rated at the top of the list, ranking first, second and third, respectively. Outside Europe, New Zealand and Canada landed at Nos. 8 and 6, respectively. The U.S. did not crack the top 10. Switzerland placed seventh and Belgium placed tenth.Why did the northern European countries come out looking so good? Overall economic health played a powerful role, says Simon Chapple, senior economist from the Social Policy Division of the OECD, which put together the report.
While the global economic crisis has taken a toll on every nation, the countries that scored at the top still boast some of the highest gross domestic product per capita in the world. Denmark, which got the highest score, is not only a wealthy country, it’s also highly productive, with a 2009 GDP per capita of $68,000, according to the International Monetary Fund. The United States’ GDP per capita, by contrast, is $47,335. Though the U.S. got an above-average score of 74, it did not break the top 10.
Wealth alone does not bring the greatest degree of happiness. Norway has the highest GDP per capita on the list–$98,822–yet it ranked ninth, not first. On the other hand, New Zealand’s happiness level is 76.7 out of 100 on the OECD list, but its 2009 GDP per capita is just $30,556.The OECD data shows that another important factor is work-life balance. While Scandinavian countries boast a high GDP per capita, the average workweek in that part of the world is no more than 37 hours. In China, which got a low score of just 14.8, the workweek is 47 hours and the GDP per capita is just $3,600.
Low unemployment also contributes to happiness. “One thing we know for sure,” says the OECD’s Chapple, “not having a job makes one substantially less satisfied.” Denmark’s unemployment rate is just 2%, according the C.I.A.’s World Factbook. Norway’s is just 2.6%. The Netherlands: just 4.5%. Many economists concur that a 4% unemployment rate reflects a stable economy. The U.S. unemployment rate is currently 9%. So much for your European unemployment comment.
When 20 % of your population is malnourished as it is in our country, then the answer is no, you cannot have a large profit margin in food. The rich or upper middle class go to whole foods and the poor get handouts with lots of free bags of hamburger helper and no fresh fruit or vegetables: Witness the inner city poverty, lower longevity rates and obesity taht’s been going on for 40 years.
you conveniently pick and choose what pleases you. the unemployment rate in south dakota is 3.5%. the overall unemployment rate in the european union is about 10%.
20% of our country is malnourished??? what is it now, a record 1 in 7 americans is on food stamps, i guess we should all get on food stamps and eliminate the scourge of malnourishment which is sweeping across our fruited plain
When Monsanto controls the seed industry and the farmers and dairy products filled with rBGH and GMSO foods, then yes it’s time for serious regulation in defense of the small or organic farmer and the worlds right to have diversity and healthy foods. The truth about Monsanto and how it is putting us at risk for world hunger by destroying off the worlds diverse seed supply http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6262083407501596844#
actually, north dakota 3.8%, south dakota 4.5%
Monsanto expose” what GMSO’s and rbgh in our milk and food supply is doing to all of us: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6262083407501596844#
yes, another conspiracy in the works! the murdoch media moguls are stifling the dissemination of free speech, and now we discover evil capitalists cornering the market on the food industry! we’re doomed, i say, doomed!
link to expose about Monsanto, the company that is taking over the worlds food supply by forcibly making us eat rgbh in our dairy and GMSO meat vegetables,fruit, and grain. http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6262083407501596844#
I can’t seem to post this link…. very frustrating. On Monsanto and how they are destroying our food supply in the world. http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6262083407501596844#
sorry for the redundancy everyone, the post didn’t go up for a few minutes, so I kept posting. Again, sorry.
Yes, E, I’m sorry I picked an article that picked out the COUNTRIES versus the 2 measly states in the US , which is in the middle of a serious recession. OMG- forgive me.
i dispute your claim in regards to denmark, and the situation in norway is that they are sitting on a s**tload of oil in the north sea. it’s best to look at the behemoths like germany, u.k. and france to get a clearer picture of the e.u.
and speaking of oil, how many more jobs and how much more wealth could be generated if we could go after all our oil resources here in the u.s? sadly such is not the case