Guest Post by Willis Eschenbach
From an interview with Lester Brown, founder of the Earth Policy Institute, a man of whom Bill Clinton said “We should all heed his advice”:
You’ve talked before about the civilizational challenge that climate change poses, how confident are you that the human race is up to meeting that challenge?
We don’t know and there is no guarantee that we will. But we do know that change can come very quickly. Look how quickly the US restructured its whole economy in 1942. At beginning of 1942, the automobile companies were producing automobiles. By the middle of 1942 they were all producing tanks and planes. It didn’t take decades or years, just a few months and they totally converted. If they could do that then, certainly we can restructure the world energy economy today. What Roosevelt did was ban the sale of cars. He didn’t say they couldn’t produce cars. He just banned the sale of cars.
Would you like to see President Obama do that?
I’d like to see him ban the sale of coal and oil.
Dear heavens, the Imperial President should “ban the sale of coal and oil”? Oh, yeah, that’s the ticket. Some 40% of US electricity, lots of our industrial energy, and ~ 100% of our transportation fuel comes from coal and oil, so I’m sure that other than the small matter of impoverishment, suffering, death, and economic ruin, banning them wouldn’t cause any disruption at all … while I want to ask “is this Imperious Idiot for real?”, the sad truth is that Lester Brown is totally serious.
But even more frightening than the horrendous economic disruption and human suffering from such a suicidal course of action is that Lester Brown is advocating tyranny, and given his history, our Imperial President Obama would likely be more than happy to accommodate him.
As a candidate, Obama spoke out strongly against expanded executive power, saying in October of 2007:
These last few years we’ve seen an unacceptable abuse of power at home. We’ve paid a heavy price for having a president whose priority is expanding his own power.
and
I taught constitutional law for ten years. I take the Constitution very seriously. The biggest problems that were facing right now have to do with George Bush trying to bring more and more power into the executive branch and not go through Congress at all, and that’s what I intend to reverse when I’m President of the United States of America.
After watching George Bush, Obama’s position on limiting executive power was one of the reasons I voted for him in 2008 … back before I realized that if Obama’s lips were moving, there were non-zero odds that he was lying, as in this case. Which is one of the reasons why I voted against him in 2012.
Now that he’s in power, and particularly now that he’s in his second term, he’s decided that he gets the last say on everything under the sun, and has presided over a huge increase in executive power, viz:
Whenever this Congress refuses to act in a way that hurts our economy and puts our people at risk, I’ve got an obligation as president to do what we can without them.
Despite being a “constitutional scholar”, he seems to misunderstand the separation of powers. He has no such obligation. It’s not his job to decide what “hurts the economy and puts the people at risk”, and more importantly, he has no such power. If the Congress decides not to pass a law, that’s their choice. The President’s job is to be the “Chief Executive”, and as such, the Constitution says he is to “take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed”. Nowhere is he given the power to make or interpret the laws. That is the job of Congress on the one hand and the Courts on the other … and if Congress won’t act, well, tough. If you don’t like the Congress, vote them out of office.
However, obviously, neither President Obama nor Lester Brown see it that way. As we just saw with the new regulations involving coal plants, President Obama is more than happy to make new “environmental” laws by presidential edict. And I’m sure that both the Imperial President and the Imperious Idiot firmly believe that Obama has the power to ban the sale gas and oil.
The Founding Fathers were very concerned that the President should NOT have this kind of imperial powers, and for good reason. They’d seen the damage that strong-men had done in a variety of monarchies and tyrannies. So they devised a system of “separation of powers”—Congress makes the laws, the President enforces the laws, and the Supreme Court interprets the laws.
Sadly, we have fallen very far from that, and President Obama has done immense damage to that system by “solving” every problem, from glitches with Obamacare to interim appointments to immigration reform to destroying coal plants, by imperial proclamation. At this point, all I can do is fervently hope he doesn’t listen to Lester Brown …
Gotta say … 2016 can’t come fast enough for me.
w.
End Note: Please do not use this as a springboard for general political attacks on either side. There are lots of web pages for doing that. The issue here is the Imperious Idiot’s asinine proposal to ban the sale of coal and oil, and the Imperial President’s claim that he has the executive power to do just about anything, presumably including Lester’s proposed ban.
The Usual: If you disagree with something that I or anyone has said, please QUOTE THE EXACT WORDS YOU DISAGREE WITH. This avoids many misunderstandings.
The Interview: The full interview is here.
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Tony,
Yes, I have the “let it burn” sentiment overcome me from time to time, and it is a course worthy of consideration. I agree it is AN answer and a reasoned one at that. I didn’t get the sense that was Mr. Eschenbach’s answer though, and as you note, you’re not speaking for him.
Many of my very close friends made the same choice, and I understand the lack of knowledge that leads normal, intelligent people to make such a terrible decsion. If that never happened, we wouldn’t have near the kinds of trouble we have in humanity.
george e. smith says:
July 7, 2014 at 2:40 am
US law recognizes both organized & unorganized militias. The National Guard is essentially a second Army & Air Force (Reserve Component) alongside the Active force. It is part of the organized militia. The unorganized militia is basically everyone within defined age limits who is able-bodied & not a crook or a kook.
The militia clause is in the 2nd Amendment because it’s a way of saying that the right to keep & bear arms may be denied people convicted of crimes or too mentally disordered to serve in the militia. And also because the US could not have won its independence without militia & the Founders rightly feared a strong standing army as a threat to financial security & freedom.
Marc, over and over you present this as though I picked Obama out of a dozen good candidates … sorry, but that’s not the case.
Instead, I made a careful decision, as I’m sure you did, evaluating dozens of factors—what they said, what they did, what they looked like when they spoke, who their followers were, who was their running mate, what their running mate said, what they did, what they looked like when they spoke, what their histories were, what their programs were, the list is very long.
At the end a man adds it all up and makes a decision. In my books, it was a close call. At the end of the day, to me the difference came down to Sarah Palin. The thought of that clueless wimp being in charge of the USA made my stomach crawl … and in fact, in the event she couldn’t even handle being Governor and walked out on the job.
Now, clearly you put different weight on those things … and that’s fine. That’s why we have elections overall.
But to claim, as you are doing, that I was an idiot for the choice I made?
Sorry, my anonymous friend. I put as much thought into it as you did, and neither of us know what would have happened had McCain-Palin been elected. We might be sitting here with President Palin claiming that she can see Russia from the White House, and all of your friends would be saying “You voted for HER? Really?
As a result, I find your insistence that you have the high moral ground to be both unpleasant and untrue. Yes, I understand that you justify it by saying that you are the one and only man in the world who has never, ever, been fooled even once by a politician … except when you were fooled by a politician or two.
Of course, you went on to tell us that when that happened you were only fooling yourself, and the politicians didn’t fool you one bit … riiiiiight, that’s the ticket …
So how about you come to confession, and confess your historical idiocy, and tell us just how stupid you were to fool yourself, and about all that you learned from that? Then we can all sit here in judgement on you, like you are sitting in judgement on me, and we could laugh at what a chump you were, and go on and on (as you do) about “how could you have possibly ever been such an idiot as to fool yourself over X” …
Your anonymous assumption of moral superiority, simply because you voted for Sarah Palin for President-In-Waiting, is most unpleasant.
Finally, you say:
I do give the benefit of the doubt to earnest inquiries that aren’t meant to impugn. But you have done nothing of the sort. To the contrary, you have been relentlessly trying to impugn both my character and my intelligence simply because I didn’t vote for the same two lying politicians that you voted for. Here’s your opening shot, first words out of your foul mouth:
You followed that up with:
Is that your idea of an “earnest inquiry”, Marc? Really? Is that how you generally open a conversation with someone you’ve never met? No questions, no attempt to be pleasant, you start right out of the box by claiming that they’re an idiot?
Because if you seriously think that you have been engaged in “earnest inquiry”, you desperately need to get out of your mom’s basement more often. Here in the real world, those are not called an “earnest inquiry”, they are called “ugly, baseless, and unwarranted attacks”.
So I’m sorry, but a nasty little man like you, who starts out by attacking me in a host of ways, and continues from there to demand that I answer questions so that you can scoff at my answers, gets no slack from me at all.
Go ask your unpleasant questions of someone else, there’s a good fellow. You’ve burnt your bridges with me. Perhaps you are used to people who tolerate that kind of unpleasant behavior. I’m not one of them, so you’d better go mindlessly attack someone else. I bite back.
w.
Have never voted for a Democrat in anything other than local election stuff. I used to be staunchly Republican. Obama is not my beloved community organizer. However, the fact remains that Presidents have been issuing orders since the inception of the Republic. If the Founding Fathers really so feared the misuse of executive power… executive orders and proclamations would have been well defined in the Constitution. They were not, the very first President made rules. Idk, did they all kinda like the idea? In addition to judicial review of executive orders, Congress also has ways to overturn executive orders by passing legislation and can sometimes cease funding. Admittedly, it now takes a (hard to get) supermajority to override a veto of the legislation. <—–Something needs to be done about that. SCOTUS determined 200+ years ago that a President has two kinds of task: ministerial and discretionary. That was reaffirmed in 1867 Mississippi vs Johnson.
Willis,
You are posting on the most widely read blog on Climate in the world.
Climate change is the single most dangerous avenue for giving tyrants a path to undermining personal liberty and empowering themselves, which would lead to untold misery and deaths.
And merely by posting here, you are putting yourself up as a thought leader on a historic issue at a critical time. If you don’t want to answer hard questions, then I don’t see why you should hold yourself up as a thought leader.
This is a thoroughly political issue, and political wisdom in my view is a prerequisite for thought leadership, especially when posting on the political dimensions.
As I said, I didn’t vote for Palin, McCain is still alive, and if you checked, his health status before election was thoroughly vetted.
It is your choice to be a thought leader or not. If you think questions regarding your political judgment are impertinent, I am not sure why you are posting in a place where thought leadership on the historical issue of the time is expected. You didn’t have to say you voted for Obama,
`but since you did
`and since he consistently takes anti-science stances in furtherance of the concentration of government power,
`and since it was obvious that he was going to do so beforehand,
It would serve your loyal readers well, including me, to clarify how you are no longer subject to the delusion that led you to electing an entirely unqualified, dogmatic ideologue as the leader of the FREE world.
By the way, with your stated loyalty to facts and truth, please refer to the following:
Willis: “We might be sitting here with President Palin claiming that she can see Russia from the White “House, and all of your friends would be saying ‘You voted for HER? Really?'”
Claim:
During the 2008 presidential campaign, Sarah Palin said: “I can see Russia from my house.”
FALSE
Read more at http://www.snopes.com/politics/palin/russia.asp#fRCU39MBz3oaOQbZ.99
The basis for the line was Governor Palin’s 11 September 2008 appearance on ABC News, her first major interview after being tapped as the vice-presidential nominee. During that appearance, interviewer Charles Gibson asked her what insight she had gained from living so close to Russia, and she responded: “They’re our next-door neighbors, and you can actually see Russia from land here in Alaska, from an island in Alaska”:
Two days later, on the 2008 season premiere of Saturday Night Live, Tina Fey and Amy Poehler appeared in a sketch portraying Sarah Palin and Hillary Clinton, during which Fey spoofed Governor Palin’s remark of a few days earlier with the following exchange: FEY AS PALIN: “You know, Hillary and I don’t agree on everything . . .”
POEHLER AS CLINTON: (OVERLAPPING) “Anything. I believe that diplomacy should be the cornerstone of any foreign policy.”
FEY AS PALIN: “And I can see Russia from my house.”
Henceforth, invocations of Sarah Palin frequently employed the line “I can see Russia from my house,” rather than the words she actually spoke, “You can actually see Russia from land here in Alaska.”
As to the question of whether one can actually see Russia from Alaska, Governor Palin was correct: such a view is possible from more than one site in that state. A Slate article on the topic noted that: In the middle of the Bering Strait are two small, sparsely populated islands: Big Diomede, which sits in Russian territory, and Little Diomede, which is part of the United States. At their closest, these two islands are a little less than two and a half miles apart, which means that, on a clear day, you can definitely see one from the other.
Also, a 1988 New York Times article reported that: To the Russian mainland from St. Lawrence Island, a bleak ice-bound expanse the size of Long Island out in the middle of the Bering Sea, the distance is 37 miles. From high ground there or from the Air Force facility at Tin City atop Cape Prince of Wales, the westernmost edge of mainland North America, on a clear day you can see Siberia with the naked eye.
Read more at http://www.snopes.com/politics/palin/russia.asp#fRCU39MBz3oaOQbZ.99
I would be happy to give you my personal email address if you would otherwise keep it confidential since you seem so bothered by anonymity. Or perhaps you have it as the moderator of this thread? Feel free to shoot me an email and I can provide verification on who I am.
Having read and commented on this blog for years, anonymously and never heretofore problematically, I really don’t understand why my question is heating you up so much.
Thanks,
Marc
PS
Regarding your comment below:
Willis: “Instead, I made a careful decision, as I’m sure you did, evaluating dozens of factors—what they said, what they did, what they looked like when they spoke, who their followers were, who was their running mate, what their running mate said, what they did, what they looked like when they spoke, what their histories were, what their programs were, the list is very long.”
Your contention is you made a reasonable decision at the time given the available information. We can simply agree to disagree. I am confident that had the information you made available to yourself about historical cults of personality — and their inevitable pernicious outcomes — beenn broader and more informed, you would not have made that judgment nor would you stand by it now. That is a statistically valid and empirical assessment.
I wish you well and don’t feel any of the antipathy expressed by you in your comments as I can see you believe them to be reciprocal ad hominem in response to the slights you took from my comments, but none was intended. And I am not trying to bite anyone, whether first or biting back. I just want the world to quit making the same horrrendous and deadly mistakes over and over again.
Marc says:
July 7, 2014 at 5:00 pm
Marc, was there some part of the close of my previous post that was unclear? Let me repeat it in case you missed it:
Because if you didn’t understand it, just ask, I’m more than happy to explain any part of it real slowly so you can get hold of what it means. Let me just hit the high points in summary fashion.
You are an unpleasant person. You came in attacking me from your very first comment. You do not understand what anonymity does to your credibility. Your claims to never have been fooled by a politician except when you fooled yourself are a pathetic joke. Your credibility with me is zero. In short, I have no interest in answering your nasty accusations or playing your sick games in any form. As before, I request that you go inflict yourself on someone else.
Do you understand that now? Because if not … well, I’m not surprised.
w.
Are you a tyrant too?
Plus, you just got caught making untrue statements about Palin and me.
I am sure the readers can each judge our comments, I’m cool with that.
Plus, I offered to reveal my identity to you, but that would only reveal how silly your insinuations that I was misrepresenting things were, because I wasn’t.
Do you not know the difference between not understanding and not agreeing? I understood every thing you said at the moment you said it, I just disagree, including the notion that you get to go unchallenged whenever you throw a fit of pique, and that means I have to go away.
“””””…..Gunga Din says:
July 7, 2014 at 1:20 pm
george e. smith says:
July 7, 2014 at 2:40 am
……….Some have argued that the various State National Guards, are militias. Far as I know, they are part of the DOD………..
=============================================================
And state National Guards did not exist at the time. If the Feds can step in and take over, how can they be state militias?……
All completely irrelevant. It matters not what a militia is; any sort of militia.
As you will find over the NRA building in WDC (I believe), the second amendment simply says “The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.”
It’s not written in legal gobbledegook, it is written in plain English, that any 4-H club member can understand.
One could cite hundreds of reasons the framers could have given for having such an amendment. The chose one such reason. They could have cited others.
It’s irrelevant because the meaning as not conditional on any such reason. It’s a reason, not a modifying condition.
The Stock Market being in a great state of disarray; The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.
There you have it. Exact same meaning; different reason offered.
Make up your own irrelevant reasons; English grammar rules (applied to what was written), don’t modify the meaning in any way at all.
The solution to the mystery, is not in some dictionary definition of militia, or even well regulated militia.
It’s in the English grammar book, under sentence structure.
Peter Dunford says:
July 5, 2014 at 1:45 am
———–
Speaking of electric cars, another Telsa blew up today. They have made safety improvements because of the danger of batteries blowing up under passengers. Still an impressive stock.
http://laist.com/2014/07/04/tesla_splits_in_half_and_explodes_a.php#photo-4
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RCn1CufaCYc&feature=youtu.be
http://www.forbes.com/sites/afontevecchia/2013/11/12/elon-musk-on-the-tesla-fires-headlines-are-deceiving-model-s-is-safest-car-on-the-road-by-far/
An inexact modernized quote from François Guizot, mid nineteenth century:
“If a young man is not a socialist he has no heart. If an old man is a socialist, he has no brain.”
Marc says:
July 7, 2014 at 6:54 pm
Is there some part of “it is impossible to determine if an anonymous person is lying” unclear to you? You can say whatever you want about Palin, about me, about climate, about anything, and walk away and change your alias and never have to defend your words. When you decided to become anonymous, you gave up all of your credibility for anything other than science, where we can independently determine if your scientific claims are true are false. So I don’t give a rat’s posterior what you say, it’s all just creepy snarling and biting, and as far as I know, you’re some twisted sixteen-year-old kid with too much time on your hands.
As a result, Marc, I don’t believe a damn word coming out of your mouth … and most of them are unpleasant.
Nope. Just sick of you attacking me. You are an unpleasant person who has gone out of his way to abuse me from the first words you uttered, and you have continued that to the present. Why on earth should I discuss serious matters with you, when all you want to do is be amazed at how stupid I am? Do you think that kind of behavior makes people want to talk to you? Reality check … they make people want to spit on you. You’re an ugly, nasty man who has no clue about how to hold a discussion. Go abuse someone else.
w.
Have a look at this link
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2683560/Green-group-lobbyists-drafted-White-House-energy-policy-tit-tat-revenge-against-secret-Bush-Cheney-oil-industry-meetings.html
well worth a read:
Willis,
The title of your article is derogatory — imperial, imperious, idiot — and you are right. Yet you through your vote empowered this president and people like Lester Brown.
Why are you not worried about your attack on them, but are whining that I haven’t been gentle enough on you.
And you lied about Palin’s statements, either through willful ignorance or something else. You could have found that the characterization of her comments that you repeated was a willful media fabrication with one 30 second internet search. That probably means you are gullible or biased.
You are correct that I find a credibility gap in you now that I know you voted for this kind of baloney when the information was there to avoid that.
By posting here, you are making yourself a public figure, but you just want a one way megaphone, much like Mann, and you want to hold yourself above critique — the world doesn’t work the way you want it to. I have been blunt but not nasty. The feeling of nastiness that you feel comes because I have hit a nerve because it is true that the information was there for you to avoid voting for Obama and you missed it. That is germane to this post and to your credibility as a public voice on CAGW and it’s political ramifications.
I am just the bearer of the news you refuse to hear.
I now see the personality trait that enabled your vote for Obama, and it appears to be uncorrected. Sorry you can’t hear the truth.
If you don’t like my anonymity, email me, and quit making up speculation. You won’t because you actively resist the truth when it conflicts with the self image you want to maintain.
Peace and love,
Marc
Marc says:
July 8, 2014 at 7:05 am
Seriously? You expect an answer from me? Dang, my friend, you are dumber than you look.
w.
===================================================================
I think we are “disagreeing” about something we really agree about.
Yes, “The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.” is a statement that can and does stand alone.
But in the context of a document that limits the authority, sets the boundaries, of the Government the Constitution just formed by those who just took up arms to preserve the rights Government had taken from them? The “introductory statement” fits.
“We the Sheeple” are not to be toothless.
Regards.
Gunga Din says:
July 8, 2014 at 2:33 pm
As first introduced by Madison in the House on June 8, 1789, his proposed amendment read:
“The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed; a well armed and well regulated militia being the best security of a free country but no person religiously scrupulous of bearing arms shall be compelled to render military service in person.”
Following revisions, this version was passed by the House on August 24 & sent to the Senate:
“A well regulated militia, composed of the body of the people, being the best security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed; but no one religiously scrupulous of bearing arms shall be compelled to render military service in person.”
After more revision, the Senate passed this version on September 9:
“A well regulated militia being the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.”
The House accepted the Senate’s changes on September 21, 1789, but added the words “necessary to” & capitalized “People”:
“A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the People to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.”
===============================================================
Thanks!
Years ago I read that the 2nd originally read as you quoted it. I tried to find info on that today but couldn’t. It seems that the first comma “…militia, being…” was probably added before it was was sent to the states before ratification.
I did learn that Madison wanted to incorporate the ideals of the Bill of Rights into the Constitution itself but he was shot down because that would be looked upon as changing the Constitution. (I assume it’s text had already been approved.)
Gunga Din says:
July 8, 2014 at 3:35 pm
You’re welcome.
The comma-based argument is simply idiotic when you look at the history surrounding the right to keep & bear arms.
Madison did indeed want to incorporate a version of the first two paragraphs of the Declaration into the Constitution. I don’t know why his suggestion wasn’t taken up, but the whole Declaration stands at the head of the US Code, & the Constitution references the Declaration by saying “done in Convention by the Unanimous Consent of the States present the Seventeenth Day of September in the Year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and Eighty seven and of the Independance of the United States of America the Twelfth”.
Willis:
w.
Willis,
I already received an answer from you.
I asked you what lesson you learned from voting for Obama that would prevent you from making a similar mistake in the future.
Through your non-answer, whether you meant to or not, you answered my question as follows: “I learned nothing, and furthermore I remain incapable of self-reflection on certain matters.”
You wish I was “dumb” or “16” or “living with my [deceased] mother” or “anything” so long as it justifies your internal compulsion to dismiss me to protect your (apparently fragile?) ego.
I have read your stuff here for the last couple of years with interest. I have never criticized you previously, because I never encountered anything that evoked it. Your revelation of a vote for Obama did — especially in juxtaposition with your criticism of Obama and Brown — shock me and reveal something to me. Furthermore, your willingness to lie about Palin and to purposely insinuate that I was untrustworthy to tell the truth because I merely protect my family through my privacy (think Brendan Eich), reveals even more about you. Your further use of of foul language (“creepy”, etc.), toward me, despite never receiving any, clinches the case.
Your silly made-up rule — that anonymity disqualifies valid comment — is simply another self-protective piece of artifice that cannot withstand epistemological scrutiny; but it makes you feel better I am sure to cling to such a convenient self-shielding device. I had a a great professor that had a random numbering system for grading assignments — term papers and essays — so that he could grade them blind to the authors and therefore judge them without bias or preconception.
I didn’t enter this exchange looking for a disagreement or believing you were an “idiot” (your word, not mine) or having any belief that you had such a major blind-spot or to make you look bad. However, I leave it realizing I need to be skeptical of your ability to make subjective policy and political judgments and that you have an impoverished understanding of the principles of constitutional republican government as originally conceived for our country, which will cause me, going forward to disqualify your comments related to potential policy judgments on CAGW.
I am sorry that your avoidance of a valid question necessitated such a blunt evaluation to get at the gist of things; but I thank you for engaging with me sufficiently to reveal that information, which will be useful in the appropriate allocation of my time in the future.
All the best,
Marc (aka the creepy, nasty, little teenager living with his dead mother)
Marc says:
July 8, 2014 at 8:05 pm
Talk to someone else, my friend. You have been attacking me from the first words out of your mouth. It gets old …
w.
Oh, Willis, I will.
Once I learn someone is not near as smart as they think they are, they become very tedious to try to talk to.
And yes, i am attacking you over your moronic vote for Obama, it is intellectually indefensible. I will skip your posts and I think Anthony is doing himself a disservice by giving you the forum, and I have now learned many others do too.
Your behavior merits attack.
Marc:
I’m on Willis’s side in your attack on him for voting for Obama. In a scientific blog, personal attacks are counterproductive as well as being hurtful.
Terry,
Please read the entire thread before you comment. This wasn’t a science posting by w., it was a political one from top to bottom.
Furthermore, if you read the entire thread, you will see who (i.e., w.) used foul language, lies, personal attacks and false insinuations to try to make their points. Doesn’t bother me considering the source.
I have discovered there are w. sycophants here and he loves that. But, please read the entire thread before such a comment.
Btw, if you haven’t noticed, this is not just a science blog. What about all the mindless w. posts about fishing trips and whatever. Sorry, but that just shows me the guy needs attention too much attention.
This kind of stuff is driving a multi-year follower of the blog like me to stay away. It really taints the entire contents to have a guy like this be featured — and I am a hardcore, Anthony-like realistic, science-based skeptic, but his guy is too much, a detriment in the end.
Marc:
You’re right in suspecting that I didn’t read the entire thread before commenting. If I was unfair to you, I apologize.
“””””””…….Gunga Din says:
July 8, 2014 at 2:33 pm
george e. smith says:
July 7, 2014 at 8:45 pm
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/07/05/the-imperial-president-and-the-imperious-idiot/#comment-1679591
===================================================================
I think we are “disagreeing” about something we really agree about…… “””””
Well Mate, I agree with you on that. And I wasn’t trying to be ornery either.
It seems that the politicians and the lawyers, are incensed that the Constitution is written in rather ordinary English (of the day) that anyone (including “the people”) can fully understand.
So they are superfluous when it comes to “interpreting” the Constitution.
“Interpreting” means replacing words with “other” words.
And in “other” words lies “other” meaning.
So we should use the words that are there; and NOT “interpret” them, to add “other” meaning.
But I’m always amazed that everyone ignores the ninth amendment , in which really lies the power of “the people”.
The Constitution conveys no rights to “the people”. We already declared full ownership, in the Declaration of Independence.
In the Constitution, we gave up some rights to the Government(s) ; “in order to form a more perfect union.” The ninth says we keep the rest.
Terry,
Thanks for the thoughtful and considerate reply.
Best,
Marc