There are several lessons that the federal government can learn from the experience with fiscal rules in the states. First, a strong federalist system is required to restore fiscal sanity. This requires devolution of federal programs to state and local governments. The experience with welfare reform reveals that state and local governments can deliver these services more efficiently than the federal government.
Devolution must be accompanied by greater fiscal autonomy, shifting tax and expenditure powers from the federal government to state and local governments. Fiscal autonomy for state and local governments would restore the strong federalist system envisioned in the Constitution. //
Recent research discovered that more than the required number of states called for such a convention of states in 1979, yet Congress failed to act. Legislation introduced in Congress this year (H.C.R. 24) would require Congress to fulfill its obligation under Article V of the Constitution to certify and count state resolutions and call the convention.
Non-profit organizations are now working with state legislators in an appeal to the Supreme Court for a Declaratory Judgement that would require Congress to record and count the applications. State legislators and citizens must now step up and demand that Congress set the time and place for such a convention as required under Article V. That may be our only recourse to restore dynamically growing credence capital and fiscal sanity.
The time for action is now.
they were released on their own recognizance, which means police have nothing to arrest them on, on the assumption – which they have to operate on – that they’ll be back for their [March 4] court date.”
“The chances of that happening when four people get on a bus with false names and head for the city that literally you can cross the street into the Mexican border is probably unlikely,” he added. //
This is what "criminal justice reform" and defund the police have brought us – get-out-of-jail-free cards for criminals in cities like the Big Apple, Los Angeles, and San Francisco. The phrase, “do the crime, serve the time” seems like a distant memory. Now it’s more like, “do the deed, get quickly freed.” //
Weminuche45
21 minutes ago
anarcho-tyranny:
The law is powerless to help you, but it can still harm you.
In simple terms, anarcho-tyranny is when the state stops upholding its end of the social contract and uses its monopoly on violence for its own ends.
Apropos of nothing, I'm thinking "The Russians, the British, the Australians and the Chinese…" sounds like the beginning of one of these "…walked into a bar" jokes.
(I must have it on my brain. Half an hour ago, i watched a video on the "Sumerian dog walks into a bar…" world's-oldest-joke meme. I didn't even know it was a thing, an honest-to-God 4,000 year old joke written in cuneiform, on a clay tablet. And nobody understands the punchline. Archaeological mystery).
Imagine my disappointment 🙂
In compensation for that, Here's a paranoid thought (of my own devising), for the enjoyment of budding conspiracy theorists…
The idea that the moon landing was faked, did not originate with some guy fond of tinfoil headgear.
Stay with me…
Instead, the US Government has a secret Conspiracy Theory Facilitation Program… tasked with devising the most floridly paranoid and deliberately wackdoodle "theories" possible, and then setting them free… (which are almost guaranteed to flourish, in the wild, among the nut-jobs roaming the streets of America).
These wacky ideas are planted and nurtured to create a default public perception, a conditioned herd-reflex, so that when the shadowy powers really DO need to "conspire" for nefarious purposes (maybe blow up some buildings to create a useful massive shift in public opinion, idk) …it's just that much easier to discredit the troublesome skeptic who happened to notice some really glaring loose ends …
But when he tries to tell a fellow citizen, they think "crazy dude living under a freeway overpass"
Skeptic is quite aware of this, and clams up.
Hmmm…
We used to shut away our mentally ill fellow citizens in asylums, keeping these tortured souls hidden from view. And medicating them with drugs to reduce the intensity and craziness of their hallucinations.
But then we had a top-down policy shift, taking away their thorazine, shutting down their treatment facilities, and casting the frightened inmates out into the streets. Supposedly because this is more humane and dignified. It also happens to be cheaper. They now live under freeway overpasses. And they panhandle. They are in our faces at stoplights and outside store entrances.
This doesn't make sense, unless… unless…
OMG
That's why the skeptic clammed up. I didn't actually call him a nut-job, but I looked at him like he was like a homeless crazydude and excused myself to supposedly refresh my drink. I acted like he had an infectious disease…
It's almost like i was conditioned to react that way…
And they've taken 1984 off of the recommended reading list for highschool students. Orwell who?
Nahhh….
[DISCLAIMER: The above is just sarcasm or humor or an exercise in creative writing. I promise, swear and affirm that I one-hundred-percent disavow all of the crazy Un-American thoughts therein. Keep this bag away from small children, it is not a toy. This product contains chemicals known to the State of California to cause cancer or other reproductive harm. The government is always our friend. I pledge allegiance to the flag! Groupthink is my Co-pilot]
Apropos of nothing, I'm thinking "The Russians, the British, the Australians and the Chinese…" sounds like the beginning of one of these "…walked into a bar" jokes.
(I must have it on my brain. Half an hour ago, i watched a video on the "Sumerian dog walks into a bar…" world's-oldest-joke meme. I didn't even know it was a thing, an honest-to-God 4,000 year old joke written in cuneiform, on a clay tablet. And nobody understands the punchline. Archaeological mystery).
Imagine my disappointment 🙂
In compensation for that, Here's a paranoid thought (of my own devising), for the enjoyment of budding conspiracy theorists…
The idea that the moon landing was faked, did not originate with some guy fond of tinfoil headgear.
Stay with me…
Instead, the US Government has a secret Conspiracy Theory Facilitation Program… tasked with devising the most floridly paranoid and deliberately wackdoodle "theories" possible, and then setting them free… (which are almost guaranteed to flourish, in the wild, among the nut-jobs roaming the streets of America).
These wacky ideas are planted and nurtured to create a default public perception, a conditioned herd-reflex, so that when the shadowy powers really DO need to "conspire" for nefarious purposes (maybe blow up some buildings to create a useful massive shift in public opinion, idk) …it's just that much easier to discredit the troublesome skeptic who happened to notice some really glaring loose ends …
But when he tries to tell a fellow citizen, they think "crazy dude living under a freeway overpass"
Skeptic is quite aware of this, and clams up.
Hmmm…
We used to shut away our mentally ill fellow citizens in asylums, keeping these tortured souls hidden from view. And medicating them with drugs to reduce the intensity and craziness of their hallucinations.
But then we had a top-down policy shift, taking away their thorazine, shutting down their treatment facilities, and casting the frightened inmates out into the streets. Supposedly because this is more humane and dignified. It also happens to be cheaper. They now live under freeway overpasses. And they panhandle. They are in our faces at stoplights and outside store entrances.
This doesn't make sense, unless… unless…
OMG
That's why the skeptic clammed up. I didn't actually call him a nut-job, but I looked at him like he was like a homeless crazydude and excused myself to supposedly refresh my drink. I acted like he had an infectious disease…
It's almost like i was conditioned to react that way…
And they've taken 1984 off of the recommended reading list for highschool students. Orwell who?
Nahhh….
[DISCLAIMER: The above is just sarcasm or humor or an exercise in creative writing. I promise, swear and affirm that I one-hundred-percent disavow all of the crazy Un-American thoughts therein. Keep this bag away from small children, it is not a toy. This product contains chemicals known to the State of California to cause cancer or other reproductive harm. The government is always our friend. I pledge allegiance to the flag! Groupthink is my Co-pilot]
Nayib Bukele @nayibbukele
·
We are HONORED to receive your attacks, just days before OUR election.
I would be very worried if we had your support.
Thank you 🙏🏼
Rep. Ilhan Omar @Ilhan
I led Members of Congress in sending a letter to @SecBlinken urging action on threats to democracy in El Salvador.
The State Dept must review its relationship with El Salvador and defend democratic values. The Salvadoran people deserve free and fair elections without fear of…
12:49 PM · Jan 31, 2024 //
Not only was Omar humiliated by Bukele, but X's Community Notes feature also stepped in to set the record straight.
"El Salvador’s democratically elected president Nayib Bukele won the 2019 election with a 54% majority," the community note read. "Under his leadership El Salvdor’s murder rate has fallen 93% and he currently has a 91% approval rating amongst El Salvadorian citizens."
Despite Bukele's popularity and incredibly successful efforts in turning one of Latin America's most dangerous countries into one of its safest, Omar and her Democratic colleagues had the nerve to go after Bukele's effective, albeit uncompromising, style of leadership. //
Maximus Decimus Cassius GeoMcGeo
an hour ago
A nation can survive its fools, and even the ambitious. But it cannot survive treason from within. An enemy at the gates is less formidable, for he is known and carries his banner openly. But the traitor moves amongst those within the gate freely, his sly whispers rustling through all the alleys, heard in the very halls of government itself. For the traitor appears not a traitor; he speaks in accents familiar to his victims, and he wears their face and their arguments, he appeals to the baseness that lies deep in the hearts of all men. He rots the soul of a nation, he works secretly and unknown in the night to undermine the pillars of the city, he infects the body politic so that it can no longer resist. A murderer is less to fear. ~ Taylor Caldwell
Our enemies are not foreign, they are domestic
The US military is almost entirely dependent upon China and Russia for a metal used in many military applications, such as explosives and armor-piercing bullets. The metal is antimony, and China currently owns 53 percent of the world's supply. However, it processes over 80 percent of antimony ore through contracts with other producers. The US's last source of antimony, the Stibnite mine in Idaho, ceased operations in 1997.
It isn't just the military that relies on antimony, though it does appear insane to import the key element in manufacturing modern military munitions from your most likely adversary; the private sector is also heavily reliant on the metal.
This issue has hit the front burner of Capitol Hill. The House Armed Services Committee is investigating the status of the Defense National Stockpile, which is charged with maintaining a strategic reserve of rare minerals. Our stockpile and the infrastructure to operate it will largely cease to exist by 2025 unless urgent action is taken.
Crap like this simply validates the idea that we are ruled by fools and buffoons. Congress has nearly sold off the stockpile of to, according to Defense News, " over the past several decades to fund other programs."
The stockpile was valued at nearly $42 billion in today’s dollars at its peak during the beginning of the Cold War in 1952. That value has plummeted to $888 million as of last year following decades of congressionally authorized sell-offs to private sector customers. Lawmakers anticipate the stockpile will become insolvent by FY25.
“A lot of what happened is Congress just getting greedy and finding politically convenient ways to fund programs that they weren’t willing to raise revenue for,” said [Massachusetts Democrat Seth] Moulton.
anon-lwil Dagwood
28 minutes ago
“The urge to save humanity is always a false front for the urge to rule it”
- H. L. Mencken
They don't want to save us; they want to dominate and control us.
Fujitsu software bugs that helped send innocent postal employees to prison in the UK were known "right from the very start of deployment," a Fujitsu executive told a public inquiry today.
"All the bugs and errors have been known at one level or not, for many, many years. Right from the very start of deployment of the system, there were bugs and errors and defects, which were well-known to all parties," said Paul Patterson, co-CEO of Fujitsu's European division.
That goes back to 1999, when the Horizon software system was installed in post offices by Fujitsu subsidiary International Computers Limited. From 1999 to 2015, Fujitsu's faulty accounting software aided in the prosecution and conviction of more than 900 sub-postmasters and postmistresses who were accused of theft or fraud when the software wrongly made it appear that money was missing from their branches.
Some innocent people went to prison, while others were forced to make payments to the UK Post Office to cover the supposed shortfalls. So far, "only 93 convictions have been overturned and thousands of people are still waiting for compensation settlements," a BBC report said. //
A Financial Times article said that the public inquiry "heard in December last year that the Post Office's lawyers had rewritten Fujitsu witness statements."
The FT article also said the Post Office, which used prosecution powers available to private corporations in the UK, obtained 700 of the 900 convictions. The other convictions came in cases brought by Scottish prosecutors. The scandal may lead to reforms of the private prosecution system that lets organizations take people to court.
Heritage Foundation and Heritage Action for America President Dr. Kevin Roberts was invited to the World Economic Forum’s (WEF) annual conference in Davos, Switzerland, to appear on a panel about “What to Expect from a Possible Republican Administration” on Thursday.
In an op-ed penned ahead of the conference, Roberts wrote that he accepted the invitation to deliver the global elites a message. “Davos must accept the moral virtues, practical benefits, and natural rights of nations, families, and individuals to govern themselves,” Roberts wrote, or “‘We, the People’” will “take matters into our own hands.”
Roberts certainly delivered that message. When asked about who will likely join a new Trump administration, Roberts said it will be those who wish to destroy “the grasp that political elites and unelected technocrats have over the average person.”
“The agenda that every single member of the administration needs to have is to compile a list of everything that’s ever been proposed at the World Economic Forum, and object to all of them wholesale,” he added. //
The Heritage Foundation president aptly pointed out that the WEF elites, “the media, the academy, government agencies, international organizations, corporations, and the arts,” don’t actually care about preserving “democracy.” They fear Trump because a Trump presidency poses an existential threat to their power — and Roberts did nothing to alleviate that fear. //
Roberts also condemned elites for scaring people into believing “so-called climate change” is an “existential” threat to humanity and pointed out that Davos’ “solutions” to the supposed climate crisis are killing people. “More than a billion people in the world have been lifted out of poverty in the last 35 years because of fossil fuels,” Roberts explained. Yet climate alarmists are shutting down energy production to replace it with insufficient green energy.
“China,” Roberts added, is “the No. 1 adversary not just to the United States, but to free people on planet Earth. Not only do we at Davos not say that, we give the Chinese Communist Party a platform.” //
“I think President Trump, if in fact he wins a second term, is going to be inspired by the wise words of Javier Milei, who said that he was in power not to guide sheep, but to awaken lions,” concluded the president of Heritage. “That’s what the average American and the average free person on planet Earth wants out of leaders.”
The kind of person who will come into the next conservative administration is going to be governed by one principle, and that is destroying the grasp that political elites and unelected technocrats have over the average person.
He really laid down the hammer with this remark:
The thing that I want to drive home here, the very reason that I'm here at Davos, is to explain to many people in this room and who are watching, with all due respect, nothing personal, but that you're part of the problem.
Blake @_BlakeHabyan
·
New: Klaus Schwab Opens The World Economic Forum Annual Meeting By Speaking About The Importance Of ‘Rebuilding Trust’:
“There’s a fundamental need to embody trusteeship, which means to care for the greater good.”, Schwab says.
Why would The World Economic Forum… Show more
7:23 PM · Jan 16, 2024
Interesting choice of words. Trusteeship implies you have some responsibility and or control over us when we are a free people — you don't have such a relationship over us, except in your mind. And when people use the term "greater good," one thinks Communism and/or someone is about to try to sell you something you don't want.
Elon Musk didn't think much of what Schwab had to say; he's called him out in the past.
Elon Musk @elonmusk
·
The real issue is that Klaus wants to be emperor of Earth. He certainly dresses for the part!
And the policies that seem to emerge from this gathering don’t seem to make for an exciting future.
7:47 PM · Jan 17, 2024 //
Laocoön of Troy
23 minutes ago
Ya' know...God must be laughing at us. Who knew that Western Civilization and liberal democracy may end up being rescued by Musk...rumored to be an atheist or agnostic? Or perhaps JK Rowling or Rogan or Jordan Peterson or even Dershowitz?
God works in a mysterous way...his wonders to perform...
He also explains how the Supreme Court opting for liberty and due process is a bad thing. If the courts are going to monitor what the agencies are doing, then the agencies might not do anything.
Because SCOTUS is relentlessly hostile to the administrative state, this system stacks the deck in favor of deregulation. Which—let’s be honest—means boosting Republican presidents and hobbling Democratic ones.
A decision is expected in June, and I'll be off work for a month, getting drunk on liberal tears. //
ConservativeInMinnesota
6 hours ago
The best thing that could happen is to strike down the administrative state as being unconstitutional. A fourth branch of government was never authorized by the founders.
Somehow the federal bureaucracies have more power over most Americans daily lives than the other three. They need reined in and brought under control. //
SantiagoMatamoros ConservativeInMinnesota
5 hours ago
Given that, the word Democrat does not appear once in the U.S. Constitution.
Article 4 Section 4
The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government, and shall protect each of them against Invasion; and on Application of the Legislature, or of the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be convened) against domestic Violence. //
ConservativeInMinnesota SantiagoMatamoros
4 hours ago edited
Agreed on a Republic. The following about the powers Congress has seems useful - Art 1 Sec 8:
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.
Congress needs to pass all laws needed to execute the powers and all other powers vested by the Constitution. Congress can't delegate their authority, the Constitution doesn't let them. Departments don't have authority to make regulatory rules, only to enforce them. //
anon-m0b0
6 hours ago
It will go 5-4 with Roberts siding with the liberals, but the conservatives winning. The DOL rule written and released this week to kill off independent contractors is a perfect reason to kill Chevron.
Side note: Notice how everyone always already knows how the liberals will vote? No one ever seems to wonder if they will vote with thr conservatives, do they? //
DK duffer
6 hours ago edited
The Chevron defense also allowed Congress to make a law so ambiguous no one knew what to do with it. So federal agencies were ‘given’ authority to make rules that interpreted the law. When people complained about an agency’s regulations Congress shrugged and said that isn’t what we intended the agency misunderstood our intent. Nothing was done to correct bureaucratic overreach and the state grew and grew and became the tyrants we have to deal with today. Do not think the bureaucracy will go quietly into the night. //
Maria_Garcia_US (XX)
5 hours ago
Fed employee here,
Chevron needs to die a very quick death. Just today, I was trying to find the legal authorization for a multi-BILLION dollar project. The supposed "authorization" upon which DOD wrote implementation policy & guidance for? Surveys. The authority gave the Secretary of the Army the right to conduct surveys. Not study anything. Not build anything. Just surveys.
About 10 years ago, I was researching legal authorization for a multi-million dollar project only to find out that we did NOT have authorization to study or build that particular project. How they got around it? By getting Senator "Don't call me ma'am. Call me senator." to get her committee together to write a committee resolution. Not legislation authorizing anything. A Senate committee resolution. The House controls the purse strings, supposedly.
Another example is "Waters of the US" under the Commerce Clause. That was supposed to mean any coastal or river waters used for commerce: the transportation of goods & services. Rivers like the Mississippi, Arkansas, Missouri. Not the Rio Grande, Pecos River, Little Muddy Creek or The Branch. And once dams were places (as opposed to locks) the bigger rivers really weren't navigable anymore. So tell me where the CEQ, EPA, even the Department of the Interior have any Constitutional leg to stand one let alone arrest, detain or fine anyone? //
Dieter Schultz Maria_Garcia_US (XX)
5 hours ago
There's been some discussion around the non-delegation doctrine and how it is really not OK for the legislature can't 'authorize another entity to exercise the power or function which it is constitutionally authorized to exercise itself'.
For my money, if Congress can't keep up on, and track of, what it wants to regulate then maybe it should consider that they shouldn't be regulating it. //
EDMUND
6 hours ago edited
Where this decision falls short is the assumption that
1: agencies base their decisions on "wisdom" rather than the raw acquisition of power and
2: that they are any more responsive to a "constituency" than a federal judge. //
Robert A Hahn
4 hours ago
We see in the way the Biden Administration deals with their new "free college for all via executive order" entitlement just how Democratic administrations will dance around the absence of Chevron.
They're regulating dishwashers under the Energy Conservation Act? Somebody sues and gets a court to say, "Nope. Nothing in the Energy Conservation Act gives you the authority to do that."
The next day they're right back at it, now regulating dishwashers under the Safety for Children Amendment to the Foghorn-Leghorn Act. The lawsuits start over again from Square One. Two years later when the courts strike that one down, the agency switches to the Germ-Free Kitchens Act of 1946. Now they claim that authorizes them to screw with dishwashers. Back to Square One again with the lawsuits.
Biden is on his third supposed reason why he's allowed to give people free college using taxpayer money. Every time a court strikes one down, his lawyers find another one. //
House Judiciary GOP @JudiciaryGOP
·
Shop at Bass Pro Shop recently?
How about Cabela’s?
Bought a bible?
If so, the federal government may be coming after YOU.
foxnews.com
'Alarming' surveillance: Feds asked banks to search private transactions for terms like ‘MAGA,’...
3:11 PM · Jan 17, 2024
MILEI: Today, I'm here to tell you that the Western world is in danger. It is in danger because those who are supposed to defend the values of the West are co-opted by a vision of the world that inevitably leads to socialism and thereby to poverty. Unfortunately, in recent decades, motivated by some well-meaning individuals willing to help others, and others motivated by the wish to belong to a privileged class, the main leaders of the Western world have abandoned the model of freedom for different versions of what we call collectivism. We're here to tell you that collectivist experiments are never the solution to the problems that inflict the citizens of the world. Rather, they are the root cause. Do believe me, no one is in a better place than us, Argentines, to testify to these two points. //
The crowd at the WEF doesn't want to hear that, though, and Milei's urgings will certainly be dismissed. Still, it's important they are made. It's important people stand up to the onslaught that is coming from Klaus Schwab and company. If they have their way, freedom and upward mobility will no longer exist. People will simply become cogs in their machines as they continue to live the good life. Want proof? The big-wigs at the WEF are currently pushing the idea of a so-called "disease X" that will kill 20x more people than COVID-19. What's their solution? More control because that's always their solution.
There is no greater existential threat to freedom than the leadership class represented at the WEF. Terrorists aren't going to fundamentally change your way of life, but powerful heads of state all singing from the same sheet of socialist, anti-freedom music can and will. Milei is a much-welcomed voice in the fight against that. //
anon-62kn
2 hours ago
Not on the public agenda at the WEF are secret, backroom meetings with the sole focus to make sure Milei is a 1-term president, and that Trump does not win - or if he wins he is immediately neutered.
Secretary Pete Buttigieg @SecretaryPete
·
Extreme weather is expected to be the top factor in supply chain disruptions next year. It reminds us how urgently we must work to set up our infrastructure for climate resiliency.
foxweather.com
Extreme weather expected to be top logistics disruptor for supply chains in 2024
3:20 PM · Jan 7, 2024 //
After the lies we were told in 2020 and 2021, I've become a skeptic/cynic whenever the government warns me about something.
In theory, the supply chain disruption in 2020 and 2021 was caused by COVID. But was it? The disruption was caused by the government's regulatory response to a crisis they created and amplified. //
In short, I see this as the leading edge of a gaslighting campaign to increase government control over our lives, and that will peak in time for Joe Biden to blame a major disruption of US supply chains that they see coming on anything but his policies. //
Wilsonreagan
4 hours ago
They are setting us up for climate lock downs. Covid was the test.
If one drop was $1, the national debt would fill an Olympic pool... 4000 feet deep...
KilRoy-db
3 days ago
Fill a tractor trailer with 18,000# of $100. bills it would take 1225 of them to carry 1 trillion
dollars.
So it would take 41,650 truck loads of hundred dollar bills for 34 trillion dollars.
MIND BLOWING THE AMOUNT WE PISS AWAY FOR SHITTY PROJECTS.......
Doubtless Democrats will argue that they can enact new laws and regulations to remedy the problem their last “solution” caused.
But the socialist left ignores that no law requires companies to invest in new drugs at all — they only do so because it makes financial sense. If it does not, then companies may invest in cloud computing technology, driverless cars, or many other types of projects instead.
Thatch @THATCH_ARISES
·
Here is some good news!
I already have to run things through my dishwaser twice because it is so "efficient" compared to the ones which only had to be run once.
Attorney General Andrew Bailey @AGAndrewBailey
BREAKING: The Fifth Circuit has sided with us in our lawsuit against Joe Biden's Department of Energy, stating "it is unclear how or why DOE thinks it has any statutory authority to regulate 'water use' in dishwashers and washing machines."
12:38 AM · Jan 9, 2024 //
Margot Cleveland @ProfMJCleveland
·
Wait! Does this mean we'll be able to buy a dishwasher that doesn't take 3.75 hours to wash and dry?
1:22 AM · Jan 9, 2024
Direct democracy not only represents a threat to freedom, but it is a political order that rejects hierarchies both natural and spiritual. //
“American democracy is cracking,” warns Washington Post Chief Correspondent Dan Balz in a recent column that presents some ideas to repair it. His suggestions include, among other things, proportional representation, diminishing the power of the Senate, and eliminating the Electoral College. What these three suggestions have in common is a desire to remove any intermediary institutions between the will of the people and government action — otherwise known as “direct” democracy. //
The framers of our Constitution felt quite strongly that direct democracy was something to avoid. In Federalist 10, for example, the Father of the Constitution James Madison warned of “the superior force of an interested and overbearing majority” on a government, or what has come to be called the “tyranny of the majority,” in which a majority of the population exerts great coercive power over minority factions. //
A generation after that founding generation, visiting French aristocrat Alexis de Tocqueville authored an extended survey of American politics and culture, Democracy in America. Tocqueville perceived that the American political system was created to resist the tyranny of the majority, “which bases its claim to rule upon numbers, not upon rightness or excellence.” //
Yet such a deliberative process of testing is slow and uneven. And we Americans are often eager for speedy solutions. Political theorists, journalists, and ordinary citizens throughout American history have been frustrated by the Constitution’s manifold methods of distributing power to deter the tyranny of the majority. If a majority of the nation’s populace wants something, they posit, why shouldn’t they be able to get it? After all, as the journalist H.L. Mencken wryly commented, “Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard.”
Such demands especially increase at times of heightened political gridlock in which the country obviously has a particular problem or set of problems but constitutionally mandated laws and procedures thwart attempts to resolve them. When we are all vexed with our politicians for failing to act in what we believe to be the interests of the nation (and its voters), it’s easy to be sympathetic to that line of thinking.
Yet we must beware of this temptation, which reflects what conservative political theorist Russell Kirk calls a manifestation of vox populi, vox dei — the voice of the people is the voice of God. In other words, as long as they constitute a majority, whatever the people want becomes the law of the land. //
As that great French observer of American politics Alexis de Tocqueville observed: “If ever freedom is lost in America, that will be due to the … majority driving minorities to desperation…”
Let’s do everything we can to avoid that scenario.
Tax his land, tax his wage,
Tax his bed in which he lays.
Tax his tractor, tax his mule,
Teach him taxes is the rule.
Tax his cow, tax his goat,
Tax his pants, tax his coat.
Tax his ties, tax his shirts,
Tax his work, tax his dirt.
Tax his chew, tax his smoke,
Teach him taxes are no joke.
Tax his car, tax his grass,
Tax the roads he must pass.
Tax his food, tax his drink,
Tax him if he tries to think.
Tax his sodas, tax his beers,
If he cries, tax his tears.
Tax his bills, tax his gas,
Tax his notes, tax his cash.
Tax him good and let him know
That after taxes, he has no dough.
If he hollers, tax him more,
Tax him until he’s good and sore.
Tax his coffin, tax his grave,
Tax the sod in which he lays.
Put these words upon his tomb,
“Taxes drove me to my doom!”
And when he’s gone, we won’t relax,
We’ll still be after the inheritance tax.