Dragon
Senior Member
- Sep 16, 2011
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And I have read the link in your sigline, not just now, but a couple weeks back, and in its entirety. Do you read it critically, that is, to consider its flaws?
I wrote it.
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And I have read the link in your sigline, not just now, but a couple weeks back, and in its entirety. Do you read it critically, that is, to consider its flaws?
That's not even close to what I said. But it is true that some significant percentage, not because they aren't smart enough, won't involve themselves because they aren't disposed to processing legislation. Heck, look at how large a percentage don't vote. And don't put that down to disalusionment, because since they don't vote, they also can't be voting vote for local township, county, and city offices, or for school board which determines their property taxes, and the quality of the education of their kids.
A very large proportion of the people need to spend their time on their work or family life , and simply will not take the time to read every bill that would be put to them in some electronic public poll.
And the media IS an important agent of information and decision making to the citizens of the country. As for an obvious alternative, you might be surprised at the number of people who never go on the internet and don't own a computer; and so much of the information on the internet is just not authentic and reliable.
And the proof we are a republic is in the definition of the word and the reality of our electoral processes not much changed for two hundred plus years. If you are suggesting that instead, we are actually a plutocracy, or perhaps because of the perceived power of an elected federal reserve that we are all slaves, and that "the Republic is dead" say that.
The problem is most bills are written as contract. An individual would have to possess a legal background to understand them or have an above average knowledge of language including Latin, which is probably why most lawmakers are lawyers by profession.
I'd speculate that only 20% of the population could make any sense out of most bills.
And there's a good reason. Laws must be written to be instruments without defects. Obamacare may well be nullified because it is not severable. But consider all the other challenges it will have to endure, and that was written by veteran legislators and their professional staff. That will not change, and laws are by their very nature complex. Its interesting to attempt to think of the range of laws that could drafted for passage into law by a democratic citizen legislature comprised of the whole population.
Exactly.
We are a Representative Democracy not a Republic.
Never seen so many people williing to give up their independance and let someone else do their thinking and acting for them. Do you really feel that your representatives truly know better than you? Do you think they are that much smarter than you? Do you really think they have your best intrests at heart?
Wanna buy a bridge?
What a childlike view of governing. A government swinging back and forth on the whims of the population. Government afraid to do anything that might displease the 51%
IMO, most laws are tyrannical anyways, especially since the Patriot Act... I don't believe our representatives have much respect for the Bill of Rights except a few.
We are a Representative Democracy not a Republic.
Never seen so many people williing to give up their independance and let someone else do their thinking and acting for them. Do you really feel that your representatives truly know better than you? Do you think they are that much smarter than you? Do you really think they have your best intrests at heart?
Wanna buy a bridge?
What a childlike view of governing. A government swinging back and forth on the whims of the population. Government afraid to do anything that might displease the 51%
Our legislators are fucking retarded..
Opinion: Elected Officials Flunk Constitution Quiz
Executive, legislative and judicial are not that difficult to remember or learn...
I have nothing to fearThat to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.
Anyone agree/disagree with this?
Once again....given we already have the finest form of government on earth, why risk changing in it?
The minority is silenced because a Democracy is majority rule. Thus a minorities voice will never matter.
In a Republic, that is different. There is a check on the tyranny of the majority.
Exactly.
We are a Representative Democracy not a Republic.
Never seen so many people williing to give up their independance and let someone else do their thinking and acting for them. Do you really feel that your representatives truly know better than you? Do you think they are that much smarter than you? Do you really think they have your best intrests at heart?
Wanna buy a bridge?
Walter E. Williams is one of the greatest constitutional authority of our times.Exactly.
We are a Representative Democracy not a Republic.
Never seen so many people williing to give up their independance and let someone else do their thinking and acting for them. Do you really feel that your representatives truly know better than you? Do you think they are that much smarter than you? Do you really think they have your best intrests at heart?
Wanna buy a bridge?
Are we a republic or a democracy?
Posted: January 05, 2005
1:00 am Eastern
By Walter Williams
© 2011 Creators Syndicate, Inc.
We often hear the claim that our nation is a democracy. That wasn't the vision of the founders. They saw democracy as another form of tyranny. If we've become a democracy, I guarantee you that the founders would be deeply disappointed by our betrayal of their vision. The founders intended, and laid out the ground rules, for our nation to be a republic.
The word "democracy" appears nowhere in the Declaration of Independence or the Constitution two most fundamental documents of our nation. Instead of a democracy, the Constitution's Article IV, Section 4, guarantees "to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government." Moreover, let's ask ourselves: Does our pledge of allegiance to the flag say to "the democracy for which it stands," or does it say to "the republic for which it stands"? Or do we sing "The Battle Hymn of the Democracy" or "The Battle Hymn of the Republic"?
So what's the difference between republican and democratic forms of government? John Adams captured the essence of the difference when he said, "You have rights antecedent to all earthly governments; rights that cannot be repealed or restrained by human laws; rights derived from the Great Legislator of the Universe." Nothing in our Constitution suggests that government is a grantor of rights. Instead, government is a protector of rights.
In recognition that it's Congress that poses the greatest threat to our liberties, the framers used negative phrases against Congress throughout the Constitution such as: shall not abridge, infringe, deny, disparage, and shall not be violated, nor be denied. In a republican form of government, there is rule of law. All citizens, including government officials, are accountable to the same laws. Government power is limited and decentralized through a system of checks and balances. Government intervenes in civil society to protect its citizens against force and fraud but does not intervene in the cases of peaceable, voluntary exchange.
Contrast the framers' vision of a republic with that of a democracy. In a democracy, the majority rules either directly or through its elected representatives. As in a monarchy, the law is whatever the government determines it to be. Laws do not represent reason. They represent power. The restraint is upon the individual instead of government. Unlike that envisioned under a republican form of government, rights are seen as privileges and permissions that are granted by government and can be rescinded by government.
How about a few quotations demonstrating the disdain our founders held for democracy?
James Madison, Federalist Paper No. 10: In a pure democracy, "there is nothing to check the inducement to sacrifice the weaker party or the obnoxious individual."
At the 1787 Constitutional Convention, Edmund Randolph said, " ... that in tracing these evils to their origin every man had found it in the turbulence and follies of democracy."
John Adams said, "Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There was never a democracy yet that did not commit suicide."
Chief Justice John Marshall observed, "Between a balanced republic and a democracy, the difference is like that between order and chaos."
In a word or two, the founders knew that a democracy would lead to the same kind of tyranny the colonies suffered under King George III.
The framers gave us a Constitution that is replete with undemocratic mechanisms. One that has come in for recent criticism and calls for its elimination is the Electoral College. In their wisdom, the framers gave us the Electoral College so that in presidential elections large, heavily populated states couldn't democratically run roughshod over small, sparsely populated states.
Are we a republic or a democracy?
What a childlike view of governing. A government swinging back and forth on the whims of the population. Government afraid to do anything that might displease the 51%
Our legislators are fucking retarded..
Opinion: Elected Officials Flunk Constitution Quiz
Executive, legislative and judicial are not that difficult to remember or learn...
How would the general population do?
Bullshot. Bush changed the Patriot Act at the last hour and expected them to vote on it and they did without reading the freaking 1300 page piece of shit. So does it matter?
Say what? Someone who uses the US Air Force logo asks us whether we agree with the Declaration of Independence as it applies to revolution? I smell a rat.That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.
Anyone agree/disagree with this?
That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.
Anyone agree/disagree with this?
No, commercials would have no affect on my vote as I do not have a television that gets a signal from anything other than the movies I tell it to play. On the other hand, you are extremely ignorant if you don't thing that the general populous is not influenced by ad campaigns when speaking about laws. Have you not seen what happens in every single vote on state propositions? The vast majority of people vote based on what their favorite TV channel or talking head tells them to. Simple fact.The minority is the only one with a voice now. The wealthy minority is the only one whose voice seems to matter. It's time we all had an equal voice, regardless of the size of our bank accounts.
Who would get in to see a senator first? You or Donald Trump?
Who would get their bill passed in a direct democracy, the one that could afford commercial ads or the one that could not?
Direct democracy would make the money issue WORSE. No longer would corporations need to buy politicians souls. Public opinion is far cheaper...
Are you trying to tell me that comercial ads would dictate your vote? Are you that easily led? I'm not, nor are most of the people on this board.
No, I actually believe that I would do far better than any of my representatives. I also thing that many of my reps do far, far, FAR better than many of my neighbors can do. Many of which cannot explain the simplest of governmental processes. As another poster pointed out, there are nuances and complexities that the vast a majority of people are simply not devoted to understanding.The minority is silenced because a Democracy is majority rule. Thus a minorities voice will never matter.
In a Republic, that is different. There is a check on the tyranny of the majority.
Exactly.
We are a Representative Democracy not a Republic.
Never seen so many people williing to give up their independance and let someone else do their thinking and acting for them. Do you really feel that your representatives truly know better than you? Do you think they are that much smarter than you? Do you really think they have your best intrests at heart?
Wanna buy a bridge?
Our legislators are fucking retarded..
Opinion: Elected Officials Flunk Constitution Quiz
Executive, legislative and judicial are not that difficult to remember or learn...
How would the general population do?
Thats the best part the general population did better than the elected officials but still failed.
There was another test done aimed at college students and they failed with flying colors...
I had to pass the civics exam twice - once in 8th grade and once in high school, apparently not all schools have the same requirements...
That is the whole problem.
We no longer have a representative Republic, that is of the people, by the people, for the people.
We have a Government that is completely ignoring the Constitution and has become a Government, of the Government, by the Government and for the Government.
That is the whole problem.
We no longer have a representative Republic, that is of the people, by the people, for the people.
We have a Government that is completely ignoring the Constitution and has become a Government, of the Government, by the Government and for the Government.
Ron Paul 2012, cause I dont see anyone else trying shut down the machine.