AMERICAN CONSERVATISM IN 2008 AND BEYOND

So just shut the **** up and try to be tolerant of an opposing point of view.

http://www.archives.gov/exhibits/charters/constitution_transcript.html
Section 8. The Congress shall have power
To lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises, to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States; but all duties, imposts and excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;
To borrow money on the credit of the United States;
To regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several states, and with the Indian tribes;
To establish a uniform rule of naturalization, and uniform laws on the subject of bankruptcies throughout the United States;
To coin money, regulate the value thereof, and of foreign coin, and fix the standard of weights and measures;
To provide for the punishment of counterfeiting the securities and current coin of the United States;
To establish post offices and post roads;
To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries;
To constitute tribunals inferior to the Supreme Court;
To define and punish piracies and felonies committed on the high seas, and offenses against the law of nations;
To declare war, grant letters of marque and reprisal, and make rules concerning captures on land and water;
To raise and support armies, but no appropriation of money to that use shall be for a longer term than two years;
To provide and maintain a navy;
To make rules for the government and regulation of the land and naval forces;
To provide for calling forth the militia to execute the laws of the union, suppress insurrections and repel invasions;
To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the militia, and for governing such part of them as may be employed in the service of the United States, reserving to the states respectively, the appointment of the officers, and the authority of training the militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress;
To exercise exclusive legislation in all cases whatsoever, over such District (not exceeding ten miles square) as may, by cession of particular states, and the acceptance of Congress, become the seat of the government of the United States, and to exercise like authority over all places purchased by the consent of the legislature of the state in which the same shall be, for the erection of forts, magazines, arsenals, dockyards, and other needful buildings;--And
To make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution the foregoing powers, and all other powers vested by this Constitution in the government of the United States, or in any department or officer thereof.

http://www.archives.gov/exhibits/charters/constitution_transcript.html
Article VI. 3rd paragraph. The Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and the members of the several state legislatures, and all executive and judicial officers, both of the United States and of the several states, shall be bound by oath or affirmation, to support this Constitution; but no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States.

http://www.archives.gov/exhibits/charters/bill_of_rights_transcript.html
Amendment X. 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.

http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/federal/fed.htm
THE FEDERALIST PAPERS

http://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/fed36.asp
Hamilton No. 36
Let it be recollected that the proportion of these taxes is not to be left to the discretion of the national legislature, but is to be determined by the numbers of each State, as described in the second section of the first article. An actual census or enumeration of the people must furnish the rule, a circumstance which effectually shuts the door to partiality or oppression. The abuse of this power of taxation seems to have been provided against with guarded circumspection. In addition to the precaution just mentioned, there is a provision that "all duties, imposts, and excises shall be UNIFORM throughout the United States.''

http://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/fed41.asp
Madison No. 41
Some, who have not denied the necessity of the power of taxation, have grounded a very fierce attack against the Constitution, on the language in which it is defined. It has been urged and echoed, that the power "to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts, and excises, to pay the debts, and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States,'' amounts to an unlimited commission to exercise every power which may be alleged to be necessary for the common defense or general welfare. No stronger proof could be given of the distress under which these writers labor for objections, than their stooping to such a misconstruction. Had no other enumeration or definition of the powers of the Congress been found in the Constitution, than the general expressions just cited, the authors of the objection might have had some color for it; though it would have been difficult to find a reason for so awkward a form of describing an authority to legislate in all possible cases. A power to destroy the freedom of the press, the trial by jury, or even to regulate the course of descents, or the forms of conveyances, must be very singularly expressed by the terms "to raise money for the general welfare.

''But what color can the objection have, when a specification of the objects alluded to by these general terms immediately follows, and is not even separated by a longer pause than a semicolon? If the different parts of the same instrument ought to be so expounded, as to give meaning to every part which will bear it, shall one part of the same sentence be excluded altogether from a share in the meaning; and shall the more doubtful and indefinite terms be retained in their full extent, and the clear and precise expressions be denied any signification whatsoever? For what purpose could the enumeration of particular powers be inserted, if these and all others were meant to be included in the preceding general power? Nothing is more natural nor common than first to use a general phrase, and then to explain and qualify it by a recital of particulars.

http://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/fed45.asp
Madison No. 45
The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the federal government are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State governments are numerous and indefinite. The former will be exercised principally on external objects, as war, peace, negotiation, and foreign commerce; with which last the power of taxation will, for the most part, be connected.

The powers reserved to the several States will extend to all the objects which, in the ordinary course of affairs, concern the lives, liberties, and properties of the people, and the internal order, improvement, and prosperity of the State.

http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/usconst.htm
Article V
The Congress, whenever two thirds of both houses shall deem it necessary, shall propose amendments to this Constitution, or, on the application of the legislatures of two thirds of the several states, shall call a convention for proposing amendments, which, in either case, shall be valid to all intents and purposes, as part of this Constitution, when ratified by the legislatures of three fourths of the several states, or by conventions in three fourths thereof, as the one or the other mode of ratification may be proposed by the Congress; provided that no amendment which may be made prior to the year one thousand eight hundred and eight shall in any manner affect the first and fourth clauses in the ninth section of the first article; and that no state, without its consent, shall be deprived of its equal suffrage in the Senate.

You don't truly in your heart think that Rev. Wright is a danger to anyone in America; you just don't like him.

Cycloptichorn

I am not, but at least the purpose is worthwhile. I imagine a few conversations were tapped inadvertantly, along with the most suspect, but the point is, don't dig on the beach to find a manure pile, you go to the barnyard. These rallies are not the place to spend our tax dollars looking for dangerous people, oe.

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And, likewise, why do you think that people who are extremely opposed to the current government dont't fall into the category of "terrorist cells"? Wasn't McVeigh a Gulf War veteran and who became more and more opposed to the government, too?

How do you know the current government is not more dangerous than the citizens on the corner? Who are more concerned about constitutional principles.

How come Homeland Security is not investigating Obama's friends, Wright and Ayers, actually you have one bomb thrower there for sure, and another guy that rails against Jews, rich people, and America. I think that would be a more fruitful investigation.

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Why do you oppose one effort and favour the other? What's your reasoning, okie?

Common sense, hows that, because you go where the principle dangers are. And be on the watch for it, don't be surprised if they trump up or find one lonely guy that had a bomb or something, that attended one of the rallies somewhere. I would not trust Obama very far, and I don't think a trumped up thing would be beyond his capability.

okie wrote:

I am not, but at least the purpose is worthwhile. I imagine a few conversations were tapped inadvertantly, along with the most suspect, but the point is, don't dig on the beach to find a manure pile, you go to the barnyard. These rallies are not the place to spend our tax dollars looking for dangerous people, oe.

How do you know that? Isn't the purpose supposedly to find terrorists and stop them before they can commit an attack? I mean, didn't McVeigh also write letters to local newspapers, complaining about taxes? Didn't he also write letters to a congressman, complaining about the government infringing on Second Amendment rights? Weren't McVeigh's main complaints ever expanding government regulation and high taxes?

Correct me if I'm wrong.

Hey, okie, remember the news stories during the campaign about, when McCain started an anti-Obama tirade, people in the audience started yealling, "Kill him", which happened often enough that McCain denounced it and backed off on the rhetoric? And that's just a normal good ole' GOP rally.

MontereyJack wrote:

Hey, okie, remember the news stories during the campaign about, when McCain started an anti-Obama tirade, people in the audience started yealling, "Kill him", which happened often enough that McCain denounced it and backed off on the rhetoric? And that's just a normal good ole' GOP rally.

I think that report was never substantiated, Monterey, you need to check your sources. If you can find evidence, let us all know, okay.

The reception had been better in Clearwater, where Palin, speaking to a sea of "Palin Power" and "Sarahcuda" T-shirts, tried to link Obama to the 1960s Weather Underground. "One of his earliest supporters is a man named Bill Ayers," she said. ("Boooo!" said the crowd.) "And, according to the New York Times, he was a domestic terrorist and part of a group that, quote, 'launched a campaign of bombings that would target the Pentagon and our U.S. Capitol,' " she continued. ("Boooo!" the crowd repeated.)

"Kill him!" proposed one man in the audience.

Yes, and also I cannot guarantee that the town you live in does not have a few criminals, so you should be investigated.

It says bigots are alive and well in our country, and they are conservatives

Wouldn't you say that McVeigh at least shared the ideology of many of those teabaggers? I'm obviously not saying that every teabagger is a terrorist, but you'll have to admit that McVeigh could have easily been a teabagger.

None of the TEA PARTY people I know share even a belief in McVeigh's solution for solving the problems McVeigh wanted solved. Why, because depriving people their right to life, that they have not forfeited by denying others that same right, is behavior we despise. The same goes for the rights to life and the pursuit of happiness.

What about alleged liberals that have taken the same kind of action as the alleged conservative McVeigh? Think William Ayers, for example.

To us TEA PARTY people, the behavior of both, and all like them, are equally despicable.

Woiyo9 wrote:

So just shut the **** up and try to be tolerant of an opposing point of view.

Ow, the irony! It burns! It burns!

During the past decade we have witnessed dramatic changes in the nature of the terrorist threat. In the 1990s, right-wing extremism overtook left-wing terrorism as the most dangerous domestic terrorist threat to the country. During the past several years, special interest extremism, as characterized by the Animal Liberation Front (ALF) and the Earth Liberation Front (ELF), has emerged as a serious terrorist threat. Generally, extremist groups engage in much activity that is protected by constitutional guarantees of free speech and assembly. Law enforcement becomes involved when the volatile talk of these groups transgresses into unlawful action. The FBI estimates that the ALF/ELF have committed more than 600 criminal acts in the United States since 1996, resulting in damages in excess of 43 million dollars.