Sunday - December 16, 2007

And then there was one … because it’s the only one that we really have almost no need for.

On this anniversary of the Bill of Rights, the Cato Institute takes a look at the smoldering remains of a thing called Freedom.

Here’s the CliffNotes version ...

1st: Free speech and religion. McCain-Fiengold. What more needs to be said, except that this misguided fool is running for President, again. For religion, it’s Ok for Santeria to sacrifice animals, and of course Islam is the Religion of Peace, but God help you if put up a manger scene in a public park, or wish people a Merry Christmas if you work retail.

2nd: Keep and Bear Arms. How many thousand gun laws do we have by now? 60, 70 thousand? I’m so glad people understand the word “infringed” or else we’d really have a lot of gun laws. But hey, they’re all just “reasonable restrictions”, right?

3rd: Quarter soldiers in your house. Woo hoo, this one’s solid. Just one case in our entire national history, Engblom v. Carey, and the justices found that this right extends even further than originally written!

4th: Unreasonable search and seizure. Combine the militarization of most police departments with “no knock” warrents and you get a big mess, usually involving stormtroopers wearing jackboots. Remember Elian Gonzales?

5th: Private property. Kelo v New London. What more can even be said? If I’m the government, what’s yours is mine if I can sell it to someone who can use it to generate more tax dollars than you do.

6th: Speedy public trial and an impartial jury. Rather weakened ... Plea bargaining deals - plead guilty to the little rap, because if you go to trial we’ll turn the world inside out to screw you.

7th: Right to trial by jury. So-so at best. Who needs a trial when the gov can slam you with huge fines without one? Cato Institute points out that the government can lay some mighty heavy fines on you without any trial (I’m thinking the IRS and perhaps ATFE) but I’m not sure that argument is a best fit to this Amendment. OTOH, look up the details of the “Lautenberg Amendment” if you gunnies don’t already know the words by heart.

8th: Cruel and unusual punishments abound. Excessive punishments certainly do. Look at the penalties for crack vs cocaine. At the other end of the spectrum, look at the shenanigans going on over the death penalty. Even lethal injection is thought to “cause too much suffering”. Cato thinks denying the deathly ill experimental drugs is a violation of the 8th, but that seems like a bit of a stretch to me.

9th: You have other rights than the ones here, even if they’re not written down. Yeah right. We seem to have a federal agency and a book full of laws for every single aspect of our lives, from what we breath, eat, drink, wear, sleep on, ride in, live in, buy, build, and even say. Not to mention how we run our lives, how we earn our money, how and what we teach our children. Government is total; what unenumerated rights are left for the people?

10th: What the feds don’t get the states and the people do. Wanna bet? The States don’t have it much better than the People. Seems to me that the federal government has been grabbing everything they could since the end of the Civil War. Certainly since FDR was in office. Still, the states go out of their way to impose their crap on their citizens, just in case the feds missed anything. And if the States miss anything, we always have county and town level governments, and even the micro-government of condo associations to fill in the gaps. So please, name me the powers reserved for the people, please.

Posted by Drew458     on 12/16/2007 at 11:40 AM   
Filed Under: • Government •  
• Comments (2) • Trackbacks(0)  Permalink •  

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It's been a long strange trip without you Skipper, but thanks for pointing us in the right direction and giving us a swift kick in the behind to get us going. Keep lookin' down on us, will ya? Thanks.

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