@blatham,
Quote:re Hayden and what we got wrong was allowing public notice of our listening to her comm with the consequence of her being embarrassed - Jesus, that is pathetic.
It was pathetic.
Most people accept that the end does not justify the means. That bad means are acceptable to produce good ends.
One might set about exterminating the human race in order to return the earth to its pristine paradise of evolution and the possibility of a re-boot. Maybe evolution theory would say the inevitability of a re-boot.
Cranks and eccentrics are notorious for offering bad means in the service of good ends. Which is very easy to do when the good ends are over the horizon.
But there is also the case of good means, or what can easily be presented as good means, rhetoric being what it is in the hands of experts, which lead to bad ends.
Most people also accept that the acquisition of power, even when it has not been sought, leads to a taste for more of it. When the power has been sought the effect is magnified greatly in proportion to the assiduity of the seeking. If only because attaining it is bound to lead to a sense of "I must be doing something right."
There is a leading into temptation which is irresistible to all but the most abject of specimens such as Thersites.
Despite the Lord's Prayer the temptation is readily yielded to. Wallowed in judging from the amount of insignia and ranks of medals of many who have "made it". Those who don't wear uniforms have other methods.
A democratic constitution is a device for controlling such natural forces but they can only work, as well as maybe, where and when there is a traditional respect for constitutional procedures.
Such respect is difficult to maintain when people from top to bottom of society are shouting about what is and what is not constitutional to such an extent that it starts looking like rich Christmas pudding before being baked.
At a certain point in the decline of respect, excepting reflex respect which is unimportant, the constitution can no longer hold the line and dictatorial power become inevitable by gradual stages.
An answer is required to Eddie's position that he is protecting the Constitution so that it continues to serve as a bulwark against the forces it was designed to constrain and that the legacy of this generation is not future Americans being under the heel of a dictator or an oligarchy.
And the answer "no he isn't" is the mark of a silly twat.
Apisa can just as easily be accused of "bitching", being "deluded" and "unAmerican" as he so blithely accuses others of being.
Hayden's "Thou shalt not get caught" really is pathetic.
