American politics have certainly devolved into the factionism feared by several of our founding fathers, the extremes and special interests of both sides are controlling direction and the average persons of moderate opinion are squelched in the process. This ideological tug of war between liberal socialism and traditionalist conservatism, is only succeeding in establishing gridlock and bitter animosity. The problems we face are not being addressed, our Congress has lost control and turned into a daily monkey show on C-Span.
Non-partisan government is just a fairytale. People don't get along, they aren't philosopher kings. They just shout at each other and hit each other with canes until the other shuts up.
I have to vehemently disagree on the rest of your post. The US Constitution is probably the most powerful document in the history of the world,
*sigh*
Another Diximplication.
The bible has affected us more than any other book.
Every word was deliberate, edited, re-thought, and analyzed for years, before it was included in the document and ratified. It was intended to stand the test of time, and it has.
I disagree. The document is extremely regionalist and specifically mentions numerous current event kinds of things. The only innovation it brought was further nationalizing the states, although it didn't go nearly far enough, and this lead to the civil war.
The only reason it has "stood the test of time" is because it's not being held to. Any document that's considered infinitely inviolable will become infinitely open to interpretation; you're bible proves this. Even the textualists differ radically from the intentions of the founding fathers, just as the so called Christian traditionalists do.
Libertarians tend to be very "constitutionalist", but just think about the post office, a ridiculously unlibertarian thing. The founding fathers clearly had absolutely no problem with the government running things. They were also clearly men of their time; the only thing a government ran back in the 1700's was a post office, and so they just threw it in there. It doesn't smack of much forsight. But it also disproves that the founders had any libertarian intentions whatsoever.
Comparing it to the Mississippi state constitution is typical intellectual dishonesty, but we expect as much from you.
I only compared it to the US constitution in the way that the US constitution is very clearly a thing of its time. People only cling to it because of its positive connotation.
State constitutions are hundreds of pages of various amendments and modifications, and nothing even closely resembling the US Constitution.
Yeah your constitution is pretty goddamn ridiculous. Mine is too. But in recent years there's been a trend of passing stripped down constitutions that just layout a basic form of government and allow civil rights, instead of the monstrous attempt to codify an entire current events creed into law forever without any attempt at forsight that is your constitution.
The Founders established a set of principles, and formed a Constitution. They fully understood that society and times would change, so they also established a means to amend the Constitution. We have done so a number of times, as you may know.
No one amends the constitution because it doesn't mean anything anymore. Conservatives who pretend they believe exactly what the constitution says are even more ridiculous than the liberals and libertarians who pretend to.
Your point about "modern people twisting the words" is also well-taken, but I would change it to "liberal activists judges twisting the words"
Your being ridiculously selective. And bringing again up the myth of the "liberal activist judge". Conservatives only hate "liberal activist judges" because of one decision: Brown vs. Board of education.
and I agree 100% Issues being decided by the courts, are supposed to be decided by the people, but because they can twist the meanings intended in the Constitution to push through their liberal agendas, they do. This is because they realize most of this stuff would never pass at the ballot box.
Invidual rights trump states rights Dixie. By a long shot. 99% of the people interpreting the constitution at the ballot box to mean I have no freedom of speech or right to go to school with black people doesn't mean shit. That is probably why the founders wanted an the independent judiciary that modern conservatives decry so much while at the same time claiming they love the constitution.
