Constitutional Intent
The framers of the constitution could have never imagined our country would be ruled by multi-national corporations. The constitution was set up to safe guard the freedoms of the individuals, not corporations. How is it then that Corporations are offered more freedom and rights than real people under the constitution? The constant echo by the courts during history is that the people are safeguarded from tyranny by the political process. The founders never could have imagined a day when the political process itself would be ransacked by corporations pushing fascism. So what should the people do when they are no longer safeguarded by the political process? What does the constition say about that?
posted by John in Montana at 6:51 AM
3 Comments:
Righto comrade, the framers came up with some clever checks and balances but left some critical areas open for tyranny to get a grip.The Supreme Court granted "personhood" to corporations but an even more insidious aspect of corporate power is their consolidated ownership of the "fourth estate", the press. We are counting on lawyer types like you to help us come up with a new constitution.
John said: "So what should the people do when they are no longer safeguarded by the political process?"
Get rid of it! Change it! Demolish it!...of course, the answer seems straight forward enough. To me the problem seems more to be that so many people don't recognize that they are no longer safeguarded. Perhaps then, I think the question should be, how do we wake people up?
John, you'd be really impressed by an editorial by the Kaiman editor last week:
Draft would change perception
Peter Bulger
Montana Kaimin
"It’s a given for any war that some people will support it and some people won’t. But here at UM, and around the country, one wouldn’t know it.
The U.S. is caught in a war in which thousands of its citizens have died and across the country this fact is met with but a shrug, especially among young people.
It can’t be for lack of knowledge, as pictures and stories from the war are beamed into homes and dorm rooms every night. Yet the fiery war protests that rocked campuses nationwide in the ‘60s and ‘70s are nowhere to be seen, from today’s students or those of the Vietnam generation.
The difference is simple: during Vietnam there was a draft, and now there isn’t.
Unfortunately, the gap between the rich and the poor in America is ever-increasing, and along with it, the price of being poor. How many jingoistic politicians out there have sons stationed in Baghdad? How many well-to-do college students have relatives fighting in Fallujah? Not many.
It is the poor who die for the rich men’s war, but a draft changes that. It forces the sons of those who support the war to serve alongside those who joined the army as the only option to escape poverty.
Would George Bush be flexing his muscles to the rest of the world with such blind confidence if his kids were dying? Probably not. He’d probably start looking at the war more objectively.
He’d probably start to consider things like the recently declassified U.S. intelligence report that called the Iraq War a “cause celebre” for Islamic militants.
He’d probably start to do some math. And in doing so, he’d realize that by the end of his term, if Americans continue dying at the same rate and he continues refusing to “cut and run” in Iraq, he’ll be responsible for about 4,332 American deaths. That’s a lot more than the approximately 3,000 who died on Sept. 11, and it doesn’t even take into consideration the more than 20,000 injured in the war, many horrendously.
But the reevaluation of the war wouldn’t stop at the White House. The point is the draft would snatch up the loved ones of people from all circles. It would make everyone reexamine the war, even the apathetic college kids and their well-off families.
Maybe not everyone would conclude that the war is a bad thing upon examination, and that’s fine. And certainly the draft would be a terrible thing for the additional lives it would cost, which is why we are not advocating its reinstitution.
All we are saying is that currently the sons and daughters of privilege are not at risk, and this lessens the pressure on decision makers and others to evaluate whether this war – or any war – is worth the cost."
"What does the constition say about that?"
When will the people wake up and take notice that in light of having the ability to change the laws, one must actually take action to do it. The basic premise that actions speak louder than words applies, unfortunately, it is much more difficult to accomplish a task of this magnitude without truly spreading the word, educating and organizing in an attempt to make change happen. It starts with one person, but requires many...
Post a Comment
Links to this post:
Create a Link
<< Home