Our founding fathers were not conservative

[kaz]

Fact or not? The modern American version of "liberal" embraces "government" as a fucking panacea. In the view of such "liberals," it is THE go-to tool for solving all manner of problems.

Right, you got him there. government is not the "go-to tool for solving all manner of problems." It's only the go-to tool for solving "moral problems" where people do with their own bodies things you disprove of. Then it's time for Federal laws, guns, invading our bank accounts, monitoring our cash and driving up the price of drugs causing shootouts in our streets, funding the mafia, destabilizing governments around the world and the incredible hypocrisies of claiming you care about what's actually in the Constitution and we should make our own choices with our lives. But what's a little hypocrisy between friends...

 

[Gadawg73]

Wrong. Today's conservatives mostly certainly do support limited government.

Perhaps part of the problem you are obviously having comprehending this is that the word "limited" confuses you.

LIMITED government means that the government is LIMITED TO those powers and authorities which are carved out for them.

That's what I support. That's what true conservatives support.

Today's liberals do not even remotely support limiting government to JUST those grants of enumerated powers.

And that's why none of the Founders and Framers would buy into the modern version of "liberalism."

The balance of your post was prattle premised on the fact that you confuse political conservatism with so-called "social" conservatism. There are a number of areas in life in which even conservatives disagree. Naturally, I reject your silly attempts to pigeon-hole all conservatives into the rubric of a liberal talking pointless. But even while many so-called "social" conservatives might not like my views on some of their particular concerns, most conservatives still agree on certain fundamentals.

The grants of enumerated powers spelled out rather carefully in our Constitution are not things to be trifled with or ignored. They are not validly trumped by the commerce clause or the necessary and proper clause or snippets taken out of context from the Preamble. That's bullshit lib-"think." They focus on what they call "exceptions" and would have the "exceptions" subsume the entire notion of LIMITED Government. Again, the Founders and Framers would (for the most part) reject that kind of arrogant sophistry.

Blah, blah, blah. "Fundamentals" Like what Moe? And where are they written in stone?
Rush Limbaugh variety?
A true conservative stands for limited government and even if they are against abortion (which I am), gay marriage (could care less), gays in the military and for prohibitions, they would NEVER want government involved in banning them
So are you a conservative or not? Are you in favor of a Constitutional Amendment, since you are speaking of that document, to ban gay marriage?
A document FOUNDED ON LIMITED GOVERNMENT that many modern day so called wannahbe "conservatives" want to use to pass an amendment banning gay marriage. Are you in favor of that distortion orare you a conservative?
Do you want to use The United States Constitution, a document THAT IS DEDICATED TO the preservation of our inalienable rights, to tell a certain group of people WHAT THEY CAN NOT DO, rather than TELL THE GOVERNMENT WHAT IT CAN NOT DO?
Which is it Moe? Do you favor limited government or not and do not want the government involved in gay marriage? A simple YES or NO. No more blah blah blah.

Your "blah blah blah" bullshit is the closest you come to making any sense. Listen up, Chumpley: The fact that you are incapable of grasping simple concepts cannot be ascribed by a dork such as you to conservatives.

Limited government is the key concept of our Constitution. If you really cannot get your tiny little mind wrapped around the notion of "enumerated powers," then you can't be helped.

The powers are enumerated IN the Constitution. This isn't exactly a startling revelation, dork.

You revert to your prattling bullshit, immediately upon evading what was actually said. Look, dufus. I get that you don't want to have an actual discussion focusing on tall the points your diminutive pinhead peabrain cannot handle. It's casual. But I'm still not discussing the notion of "social" conservatives with you, ya simpleton dickweed.

Great non answer.
Go ahead and call me all the names you want to. I have played 4 quarters against 300 lb., 6' 5" OL, been shot at, beat up and left for dead all in my 56 years.
Sticks and stones.
You are not for limited government. You have no clue what it is.

 

[Agit8r]

"It sure sounds like you don't grasp that Jefferson was talking about PUBLIC entities, not private companies. But then again, you seem to have a track record of not quite grasping the things you point to as support for you irrational positions. Just noting the obvious."

Actually the quote is about the Dartmouth College case, and he is decrying the judicial activism that allowed it's charter (and all corporate charters hence) to be free from the charter-power of the state they exist within. Oh, and Dartmouth is a PRIVATE college, in case you hadn't grasped that.

 

[kaz]

"It sure sounds like you don't grasp that Jefferson was talking about PUBLIC entities, not private companies. But then again, you seem to have a track record of not quite grasping the things you point to as support for you irrational positions. Just noting the obvious."

I know, don't you love it? We're against the tea tax! Oh, the East India Company, you're against private companies. We're against the Stamp act! Ah, you hate private lawyers. Um...yeah. In liberalism, all roads lead to government. It's like trying to argue a Christian out of believing in Jesus

 

[Liability]

Blah, blah, blah. "Fundamentals" Like what Moe? And where are they written in stone?
Rush Limbaugh variety?
A true conservative stands for limited government and even if they are against abortion (which I am), gay marriage (could care less), gays in the military and for prohibitions, they would NEVER want government involved in banning them
So are you a conservative or not? Are you in favor of a Constitutional Amendment, since you are speaking of that document, to ban gay marriage?
A document FOUNDED ON LIMITED GOVERNMENT that many modern day so called wannahbe "conservatives" want to use to pass an amendment banning gay marriage. Are you in favor of that distortion orare you a conservative?
Do you want to use The United States Constitution, a document THAT IS DEDICATED TO the preservation of our inalienable rights, to tell a certain group of people WHAT THEY CAN NOT DO, rather than TELL THE GOVERNMENT WHAT IT CAN NOT DO?
Which is it Moe? Do you favor limited government or not and do not want the government involved in gay marriage? A simple YES or NO. No more blah blah blah.

Your "blah blah blah" bullshit is the closest you come to making any sense. Listen up, Chumpley: The fact that you are incapable of grasping simple concepts cannot be ascribed by a dork such as you to conservatives.

Limited government is the key concept of our Constitution. If you really cannot get your tiny little mind wrapped around the notion of "enumerated powers," then you can't be helped.

The powers are enumerated IN the Constitution. This isn't exactly a startling revelation, dork.

You revert to your prattling bullshit, immediately upon evading what was actually said. Look, dufus. I get that you don't want to have an actual discussion focusing on tall the points your diminutive pinhead peabrain cannot handle. It's casual. But I'm still not discussing the notion of "social" conservatives with you, ya simpleton dickweed.

Great non answer.
Go ahead and call me all the names you want to. I have played 4 quarters against 300 lb., 6' 5" OL, been shot at, beat up and left for dead all in my 56 years.
Sticks and stones.
You are not for limited government. You have no clue what it is.

Drinking games (against any opponent) do not suffice as validation for your simpleton point of view.

Being shot at does not make you an expert in this matter, either, obviously.

Being beaten up only means you have successfully learned how to take a beating; it tells the rest of us nothing about the alleged accuracy of your position. It couldn't. You remain wrong.

Your petty non-responsive answers don't amount to a warm bucket of spit. Your encroaching senility probably does play a role in your warped thought process, however. But that doesn't exactly buttress your contentions.

In any event, you remain entirely wrong.

LIMITED government means (in the case of our Constitutional Republic, anyway) that the powers granted to the Federal Government under our Constitution are enumerated and are thereby limited to JUST those powers.

Sorry that this obvious and correct statement of the actual state of affairs continues to elude you and mystify you.

 

[Liability]

Corporations not serving the common good of the community? "The idea that institutions, established for the use of the nation, cannot be touched nor modified, even to make them answer their end, because of the rights gratuitously supposed in those employed to manage them in trust for the public, may, perhaps be a salutary provision against the abuses of a monarch, but it is most absurd against the nation itself"
-- Jefferson; letter to William Plumer (July 21, 1916)

Question for the class: does anybody else see any "problem" with the foregoing "Jefferson quote" offered to us by agi8tr?

 

[Liability]

"It sure sounds like you don't grasp that Jefferson was talking about PUBLIC entities, not private companies. But then again, you seem to have a track record of not quite grasping the things you point to as support for you irrational positions. Just noting the obvious."

Actually the quote is about the Dartmouth College case, and he is decrying the judicial activism that allowed it's charter (and all corporate charters hence) to be free from the charter-power of the state they exist within. Oh, and Dartmouth is a PRIVATE college, in case you hadn't grasped that.

The SCOTUS decision in the Dartmout College case may be somewhat instructive to you:

In his landmark Dartmouth College v. Woodward decision (1819), Chief Justice John Marshall (1755-1835) supported the inviolability of the charter as a contract and ruled that the college, under the charter, was a private and not a public entity. As such, the school was protected from the state's regulatory power through the contract clause of United States Constitution. By interpreting the contract clause as a way of protecting corporate charters from state intervention, Marshall established the Constitution as a powerful tool for safeguarding property rights and limiting state authority.

-- mcc/078

To the extent that Jefferson seemed to waffle on that determination, your point is -- what exactly? He recognized that a Constitutional protection (the contracts clause) DID serve to protect against the abuse by a monarch. That the "ends" sought by the government might be "salutary," however, does not suffice to undercut the validity of the Constitutional protection.

The notion that the government could somehow (for the alleged benefit of the public) impose its will on Dartmouth College rather than "allowing" the College's own Board of Trustees to make determinations for the PRIVATE institution does smack (a little bit) of modern "liberal" thinking. Yuk.

Thankfully, the Constitution itself prohibits just that kind of meddling.

 

[Gadawg73]

Your "blah blah blah" bullshit is the closest you come to making any sense. Listen up, Chumpley: The fact that you are incapable of grasping simple concepts cannot be ascribed by a dork such as you to conservatives.

Limited government is the key concept of our Constitution. If you really cannot get your tiny little mind wrapped around the notion of "enumerated powers," then you can't be helped.

The powers are enumerated IN the Constitution. This isn't exactly a startling revelation, dork.

You revert to your prattling bullshit, immediately upon evading what was actually said. Look, dufus. I get that you don't want to have an actual discussion focusing on tall the points your diminutive pinhead peabrain cannot handle. It's casual. But I'm still not discussing the notion of "social" conservatives with you, ya simpleton dickweed.

Great non answer.
Go ahead and call me all the names you want to. I have played 4 quarters against 300 lb., 6' 5" OL, been shot at, beat up and left for dead all in my 56 years.
Sticks and stones.
You are not for limited government. You have no clue what it is.

Drinking games (against any opponent) do not suffice as validation for your simpleton point of view.

Being shot at does not make you an expert in this matter, either, obviously.

Being beaten up only means you have successfully learned how to take a beating; it tells the rest of us nothing about the alleged accuracy of your position. It couldn't. You remain wrong.

Your petty non-responsive answers don't amount to a warm bucket of spit. Your encroaching senility probably does play a role in your warped thought process, however. But that doesn't exactly buttress your contentions.

In any event, you remain entirely wrong.

LIMITED government means (in the case of our Constitutional Republic, anyway) that the powers granted to the Federal Government under our Constitution are enumerated and are thereby limited to JUST those powers.

Sorry that this obvious and correct statement of the actual state of affairs continues to elude you and mystify you.

Where have I disagreed with your cut and paste generic statements?
IN PRACTICE modern day "conservatives" OFFER BILLS AND ATTEMPTS TO CHANGE THE CONSTITUTION TO INCLUDE powers that DO NOT limit government.
Abortion and ban on gay marriage are just a few.
Drug laws are specific in that. You ignore and run from that fact like a monkey on fire.
If that is not clear to you then you need to go back to smashing beer cans on your forehead.
I concede to you in any and all drinking games as you are the King and brought up that for unknown reasons.
I played defensive end. You obviously were a place kicker if you ever crossed the lines.

 

[kaz]

IN PRACTICE modern day "conservatives" OFFER BILLS AND ATTEMPTS TO CHANGE THE CONSTITUTION TO INCLUDE powers that DO NOT limit government.

Abortion

While I agree with you that many conservatives would like to ban abortion, I'm not seeing this as a major movement. The current issue is the elimination of Roe v. Wade, which is a Constitutional Abomination of the highest order. Like you I am pro-choice, but I am pro-State rights too. There is no possible reasonable way to read a right to an abortion in the Constitution, therefore it is prohibited to the Federal government under the 10th Amendment, cut and dried. So if you are referring to overturning Roe v. Wade by this, then the Conservatives are restoring the Constitution in this case, not changing it.

ban on gay marriage are just a few

Again I'm not arguing there are not conservatives who want to do this, but the defense of marriage act does not ban gay marriage, it says that States don't have to recognize gay marriage performed in other States. This is clearly a power of the Congress directly (there is no other legitimate way for them to get Constitutional Federal power) by the full faith and credit clause:

"Full Faith and Credit shall be given in each State to the public Acts, Records, and judicial Proceedings of every other State. And the Congress may by general Laws prescribe the Manner in which such Acts, Records and Proceedings shall be proved, and the Effect thereof"

Clearly this allows the Congress to declare that States must recognize marriage of other States that are heterosexual but do not need to recognize gay marriages.

Drug laws are specific in that. You ignore and run from that fact like a monkey on fire

You're right they do this and you're right he's dodging the issue and running like a "monkey on fire."

 

[Avatar4321]

Let's look at the positions of the Founders:

Stood for individual liberty
Created a strong, but limited Federal Government
Didn't like taxes
Were firm advocates for spending with their means
Pro gun and self defense
Supported States rights and Separation of powers
Celebrated Religious freedom.

Clearly they were protocommunists.

 

[Liability]

Great non answer.
Go ahead and call me all the names you want to. I have played 4 quarters against 300 lb., 6' 5" OL, been shot at, beat up and left for dead all in my 56 years.
Sticks and stones.
You are not for limited government. You have no clue what it is.

Drinking games (against any opponent) do not suffice as validation for your simpleton point of view.

Being shot at does not make you an expert in this matter, either, obviously.

Being beaten up only means you have successfully learned how to take a beating; it tells the rest of us nothing about the alleged accuracy of your position. It couldn't. You remain wrong.

Your petty non-responsive answers don't amount to a warm bucket of spit. Your encroaching senility probably does play a role in your warped thought process, however. But that doesn't exactly buttress your contentions.

In any event, you remain entirely wrong.

LIMITED government means (in the case of our Constitutional Republic, anyway) that the powers granted to the Federal Government under our Constitution are enumerated and are thereby limited to JUST those powers.

Sorry that this obvious and correct statement of the actual state of affairs continues to elude you and mystify you.

Where have I disagreed with your cut and paste generic statements?
IN PRACTICE modern day "conservatives" OFFER BILLS AND ATTEMPTS TO CHANGE THE CONSTITUTION TO INCLUDE powers that DO NOT limit government.
Abortion and ban on gay marriage are just a few.
Drug laws are specific in that. You ignore and run from that fact like a monkey on fire.
If that is not clear to you then you need to go back to smashing beer cans on your forehead.
I concede to you in any and all drinking games as you are the King and brought up that for unknown reasons.
I played defensive end. You obviously were a place kicker if you ever crossed the lines.

Where haven't you?

No. Not in practice and not otherwise do modern day conservatives "OFFER BILLS AND ATTEMPTS TO CHANGE THE CONSTITUTION TO INCLUDE powers that DO NOT limit government."

Abortion. Do you happen to grasp the import of the phrase "right to life?" Attempting to prevent the wholesale slaughter of innocent life is entirely in keeping with the obligations of the Federal Government UNDER the Constitution, dimwit. It is, as I have previously noted, perfectly fair to agree that "reasonable men may differ" on the issue. It's a very troublesome issue. But morons such as you always imagine that opponents of the claimed "right" to have "abortion on demand" as some fucking vile version of "birth control" are the ones who don't care about Constitutional rights. You jackoffs are too stupid to breathe.

There is no "ban" or attempted "ban" on "gay marriage." You seem to deliberately conflate different issues, stupid. SOME conservatives do object to calling the "union" of gay couples "marriage." Other conservatives don't believe that the GOVERNMENT ought to be in the business of sanctifying "marriage" for gays or straights. The PAST legislation which the corrupted Obama Administration is now choosing to disregard (on the grounds, interestingly enough, that the President HAS a right to make Constitutional determinations) was designed to prevent the full faith and credit clause from being used to compel ONE State to "honor" the musings of some other State's judicial branch. You need to take a deep breath and calm your ignorant ass down, chumply.

Drug laws are specific in WHAT, you unclear prattling dufus? I haven't run at all, you dishonest asshole, much less like a monkey or a monkey on fire. You saying it and it being "true" are apparently inversely related, dipstick. Drug laws can be argued FOR or AGAINST -- on a national law enforcement level -- as being Constitutional. At the very least, the fact that a dope like you makes some stupid blanket declaration doesn't make your assertion true, ya arrogant jackass.

It is clear that you spent far too much time smashing something hard into your thin skull, shit-face.

YOU, you dishonest piece of shit, by the way, are the one who "brought up drinking games," turdbreath.

Nobody cares what you did 30 to 40 years ago, assmunch. The fact remains, you are utterly unable to articulate your petty little pointless in ANY coherent fashion.

Hope that clears some things up for you. But given your vast arsenal of dumb, I seriously doubt it will -- or ever could.

 

[Agit8r]

"It sure sounds like you don't grasp that Jefferson was talking about PUBLIC entities, not private companies. But then again, you seem to have a track record of not quite grasping the things you point to as support for you irrational positions. Just noting the obvious."

Actually the quote is about the Dartmouth College case, and he is decrying the judicial activism that allowed it's charter (and all corporate charters hence) to be free from the charter-power of the state they exist within. Oh, and Dartmouth is a PRIVATE college, in case you hadn't grasped that.

The SCOTUS decision in the Dartmout College case may be somewhat instructive to you:

In his landmark Dartmouth College v. Woodward decision (1819), Chief Justice John Marshall (1755-1835) supported the inviolability of the charter as a contract and ruled that the college, under the charter, was a private and not a public entity. As such, the school was protected from the state's regulatory power through the contract clause of United States Constitution. By interpreting the contract clause as a way of protecting corporate charters from state intervention, Marshall established the Constitution as a powerful tool for safeguarding property rights and limiting state authority.

-- mcc/078

To the extent that Jefferson seemed to waffle on that determination, your point is -- what exactly? He recognized that a Constitutional protection (the contracts clause) DID serve to protect against the abuse by a monarch. That the "ends" sought by the government might be "salutary," however, does not suffice to undercut the validity of the Constitutional protection.

The notion that the government could somehow (for the alleged benefit of the public) impose its will on Dartmouth College rather than "allowing" the College's own Board of Trustees to make determinations for the PRIVATE institution does smack (a little bit) of modern "liberal" thinking. Yuk.

Thankfully, the Constitution itself prohibits just that kind of meddling.

That's the thing though. Jeffersonians, and the Democrats after them believed that corporate charters were like constitutions -- that they defined the limits of power, and ought to be subject to change by the necessary processes, according to public will

The early Republican Party obviously carried some of that over, as the railroads chartered to complete the transcontinental railroad were required to transport passengers as part of their service (a requirement from which they were emancipated when Amtrack was created)

 

[Gadawg73]

Drinking games (against any opponent) do not suffice as validation for your simpleton point of view.

Being shot at does not make you an expert in this matter, either, obviously.

Being beaten up only means you have successfully learned how to take a beating; it tells the rest of us nothing about the alleged accuracy of your position. It couldn't. You remain wrong.

Your petty non-responsive answers don't amount to a warm bucket of spit. Your encroaching senility probably does play a role in your warped thought process, however. But that doesn't exactly buttress your contentions.

In any event, you remain entirely wrong.

LIMITED government means (in the case of our Constitutional Republic, anyway) that the powers granted to the Federal Government under our Constitution are enumerated and are thereby limited to JUST those powers.

Sorry that this obvious and correct statement of the actual state of affairs continues to elude you and mystify you.

Where have I disagreed with your cut and paste generic statements?
IN PRACTICE modern day "conservatives" OFFER BILLS AND ATTEMPTS TO CHANGE THE CONSTITUTION TO INCLUDE powers that DO NOT limit government.
Abortion and ban on gay marriage are just a few.
Drug laws are specific in that. You ignore and run from that fact like a monkey on fire.
If that is not clear to you then you need to go back to smashing beer cans on your forehead.
I concede to you in any and all drinking games as you are the King and brought up that for unknown reasons.
I played defensive end. You obviously were a place kicker if you ever crossed the lines.

Where haven't you?

No. Not in practice and not otherwise do modern day conservatives "OFFER BILLS AND ATTEMPTS TO CHANGE THE CONSTITUTION TO INCLUDE powers that DO NOT limit government."

Abortion. Do you happen to grasp the import of the phrase "right to life?" Attempting to prevent the wholesale slaughter of innocent life is entirely in keeping with the obligations of the Federal Government UNDER the Constitution, dimwit. It is, as I have previously noted, perfectly fair to agree that "reasonable men may differ" on the issue. It's a very troublesome issue. But morons such as you always imagine that opponents of the claimed "right" to have "abortion on demand" as some fucking vile version of "birth control" are the ones who don't care about Constitutional rights. You jackoffs are too stupid to breathe.

There is no "ban" or attempted "ban" on "gay marriage." You seem to deliberately conflate different issues, stupid. SOME conservatives do object to calling the "union" of gay couples "marriage." Other conservatives don't believe that the GOVERNMENT ought to be in the business of sanctifying "marriage" for gays or straights. The PAST legislation which the corrupted Obama Administration is now choosing to disregard (on the grounds, interestingly enough, that the President HAS a right to make Constitutional determinations) was designed to prevent the full faith and credit clause from being used to compel ONE State to "honor" the musings of some other State's judicial branch. You need to take a deep breath and calm your ignorant ass down, chumply.

Drug laws are specific in WHAT, you unclear prattling dufus? I haven't run at all, you dishonest asshole, much less like a monkey or a monkey on fire. You saying it and it being "true" are apparently inversely related, dipstick. Drug laws can be argued FOR or AGAINST -- on a national law enforcement level -- as being Constitutional. At the very least, the fact that a dope like you makes some stupid blanket declaration doesn't make your assertion true, ya arrogant jackass.

It is clear that you spent far too much time smashing something hard into your thin skull, shit-face.

YOU, you dishonest piece of shit, by the way, are the one who "brought up drinking games," turdbreath.

Nobody cares what you did 30 to 40 years ago, assmunch. The fact remains, you are utterly unable to articulate your petty little pointless in ANY coherent fashion.

Hope that clears some things up for you. But given your vast arsenal of dumb, I seriously doubt it will -- or ever could.

You are undisciplined, subject to 5 year old fits and tantrums.
Good luck to you. You are going to need it.

 

[kaz]

Do you happen to grasp the import of the phrase "right to life?"

Funny stuff. Once again, conservatives are strict Constitutionalists, until they want something, then they wipe their ass on it, like you are doing.

1) Your whole argument is "enumerated powers." This is an explanation, not any enumerated power at all. And if "right to life" is a "power," then why can't liberals misuse the "general welfare" in the same lame way and create new powers as you just did? I'm consistent. They can't, and YOU can't.

2) If "right to life" refers to a federal power, then why is murder defined by States? As BTW it was under the US under the framers of the Constitution.

Right to life doesn't mean that and never did. Once again, while lecturing us on not seeing things in the Constitution that aren't there, you see something that isn't in the Constitution that isn't there. Abortion is not in the Constitution, and therefore by the 10th Amendment, which is there, is prohibited to the Federal government.

 

[Brutus]

Not conservative????? Of course they were, they never dreamed of Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security or anything like them, and they proved it by the legislation they didn't introduce after they formed and ran the country.

Liberals really have no place in the American tradition and in fact stand in open opposition to our most fundamental principle: freedom and liberty from government. They really belong in Cuba, not here.

 

[kaz]

It is clear that you spent far too much time smashing something hard into your thin skull, shit-face

And maybe you'd know something if you paid attention instead of hiding like a scared little pussy. The Constitution is no impediment to your love of government. It's a sledge hammer to stop the other side from having government do what they want it to. When it comes to your love and trust of government to own our bodies and force people to follow your morality, the Constitution is no problem. General terms like "general welfare" are to be ignored. Other general terms like "right to life" suddenly become enumerated powers. You and the liberals are the same animal, you just have different fur colors.

 

[Cecilie1200]

Corporations not serving the common good of the community? "The idea that institutions, established for the use of the nation, cannot be touched nor modified, even to make them answer their end, because of the rights gratuitously supposed in those employed to manage them in trust for the public, may, perhaps be a salutary provision against the abuses of a monarch, but it is most absurd against the nation itself"
-- Jefferson; letter to William Plumer (July 21, 1916)

Question for the class: does anybody else see any "problem" with the foregoing "Jefferson quote" offered to us by agi8tr?

I'd guess virtually everyone BUT Tater sees the contradiction between what he said and the quote he thinks supports him.

And by the way, did they even HAVE corporations as we understand them back then?

 

[Agit8r]

Corporations not serving the common good of the community? "The idea that institutions, established for the use of the nation, cannot be touched nor modified, even to make them answer their end, because of the rights gratuitously supposed in those employed to manage them in trust for the public, may, perhaps be a salutary provision against the abuses of a monarch, but it is most absurd against the nation itself"
-- Jefferson; letter to William Plumer (July 21, 1916)

Question for the class: does anybody else see any "problem" with the foregoing "Jefferson quote" offered to us by agi8tr?

I'd guess virtually everyone BUT Tater sees the contradiction between what he said and the quote he thinks supports him.

And by the way, did they even HAVE corporations as we understand them back then?

If course they didn't have corporations like we have today. It took 2 centuries of JUDICIAL ACTIVISM to create the modern corporation. Still, the evolution had begun, hence the quote from the letter to George Logan

"I hope we shall take warning from the example [of England] and crush in it’s birth the aristocracy of our monied corporations which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of strength and bid defiance to the laws of our country."

-- Thomas Jefferson, letter to George Logan (Nov. 12, 1916)

 

[Agit8r]

The issue at hand is a question of means and ends. Modern liberals may be at odds with the MEANS of our founding fathers (a difference that might well be explained by a difference in particular circumstances) but conservatives are at odds with the ENDS that that our founders sought to a degree that no quantity of sophistic reasoning can possibly explain

"The great object should be to combat the evil: 1. By establishing a political equality among all; 2. By witholding unnecessary opportunities from a few to increase the inequality of property by an immoderate, and especially an unmerited, accumulation of riches; 3. By the silent operation of laws which, without violating the rights of property, reduce extreme wealth towards a state of mediocrity and raise extreme indigence towards a state of comfort; 4. By abstaining from measures which operate differently on different interests, and particularly such as favor one interest at the expense of another; 5. By making one party a check on the other so far as the existence of parties cannot be prevented nor their views accommodated. If this is not the language of reason, it is that of republicanism."

-- James Madison; from 'Parties' (1792)

 

[Gunny]

there, I said it. Feel free to prove me wrong with empirical fact. go on

You.

Proven. Compared to today's leftwingers, they were far right. A bunch of treasonous capitalists that didn't want to pay their taxes.

You CAN do better next time, I hope.