Originally Posted by FeelTheLove  My personal feeling is the so-called Rescue Plan is really a rescue of the existing power structure. The Great Depression, while awful, was beneficial in that it ended the era of the Robber Baron and anti-unionism that was enforced by private corporate armies with machine guns, and brought forth the modern 20th Century State that was able to defeat Fascism and Communism. My belief is that we are at a parallel point in our history, and that the vested interests in the current power structure are essentially rescuing what has become an outdated power structure. I would like to see the markets take their course, even at the price of a Second Great Depression and the loss of our status as the world's top economic Superpower to the Chinese. It would result in a re-regulated economic system streamlined for the 21st Century instead of the stupid Cowboy Pawn Shop Capitalist system it has become, and it would end our incredible murderous criminal meddling in affairs of other states.
But where are the Republicans? This bail out is obviously unconstitutional. Article 1 Sec 8, which specifies the power of Congress, state that public money can be spent by Congress in two broad universes: the defense of the state or for the general welfare of the populace. Be honest, do you see any way that their plan satisfies this clause? Only through pretzel logic. To be honest, I would expect this of the Democrats, but watching the Republicans support and defend this plan is viscerally disturbing - it is their core value that financial effort should either be awarded or punished depending on the market. Now, simply to maintain their places in the current Corporate Capitalist State, they are selling out to what I think is blatantly unconstitutional - this "Rescue Plan" should only be enacted as the constitution requires: by Constitutional Amendment, with the consent of 2/3s of the Congress and 3/4's of the states.
The Republican Party is now destroyed I think. They are really two factions, what I call the Old Fiscal Constitutionalists and the Anti-Constitutionalists. The Anti-Constitutionalists are the confused Glenn Beck faction that is constantly screaming something is "against the Constitution" when it is not, and the real fact is they have no use for the ideas in the COTUS at all. The COTUS specifies that no law regarding religion be passed by Congress, yet the Congress has in the past made "pledges" mandatory in the public schools that include religious chants, which the Anti-constitutionalist's loudly support as they demand even further violation of the 1st Amendment by demanding that Creationism be taught in the public schools, all the while confusingly claiming they want strict constructionalism of the COTUS.
Their anti-Constitutionalism is seen everywhere: they are against homosexuals having equal rights with heterosexuals, even tho the 14th Amendment states we should all be treated equally before the law. They demand The State enforce abortion laws, in violation of the 13th Amendment's prohibition against voluntary servitude and the 14th Amendment's guarantee that a person is in charge of his or her own destiny, not The State. They support the Bush Survelliance State, even tho the 4th Amendment prohibits all police actions against the populace without either probable cause or a warrant. They hate the income tax, even tho it is in the COTUS, and in a thread here, we now have one of the Beckbots claiming that providing funds to the National Institute of Health is somehow unconstitutional, even in the face of the obvious statement in Article 1:8 that that is precisely the kind of thing the Congress is set to do.
In all of this I see the destruction of the Republican Party. The Old Fiscal Constitutionalists are totally defeated within their party - their last hurrah is McCain, who has failed them miserably. The only thing that matters to them is their jobs. I am sad, as a Democrat, I often supported them when they were the voice of reason and restraint as the country went thru the excesses of the sixties. I am truly saddened they have been replaced by Anti-constitutionalist buffoons. |
