Mayor Snorkum
Banned
- Joined
- Feb 20, 2011
- Messages
- 1,631
- Reaction score
- 317
- Location
- Los Angeles
- Gender
- Male
- Political Leaning
- Libertarian
We must remember it was soulless corporations that influenced the English government toward the many injustices that our founding revolutionaries fought to throw off. If they saw today that the "free marketplace of ideas" was overwhelmingly dominated by corporations, they would consider our 'democracy' a failed one.
Yes, as history has revealed the Founding Fathers were all dedicated supporters of the proposition of "from each according to his abilities and from each according to his needs." That's why the originally ratified Constitution made each citizen a taxpayer owing the government first dibs on his wages.
Oh.
Wait a minute.
The original Constitution and Bill of Rights does not allow taxation of income. In fact, it protects the right of the private citizen to own property, and no limits are set on the amount of wealth any man can own.
The limits on the power of business or any other group to influence Congress were placed in the Constitution by flatly limiting the power the Congress has in the first place.
Article I, Section 8 defines what Congress may do, and defines ONLY what Congress may do.
The phrase "general welfare" in that Section do not serve as a stealth blank check to bypass those limitations, nor does the Interstate Commerce Clause grant the Congress the authority to trample rights guaranteed in other portions of the Constitution, such as the Freedom of Association promised on the First Amendment, the Right to Keep and Bear Arms in the Second, and the security of one's person promised in the Fourth.
The Founders recognized that the Constitution would be effective for as long the people understood their Constitution and required their representatives obey it, and for no longer than that. The rise of the Progressives (aka socialists) in the Twentieth Century ushered in a concerted effort to subvert the Constitution and make the people either ignorant of it's meaning or desirous of it's obsolecence for reasons of personal greed. The Progressives succeeded to the point where it's doubtful the republic can be restored.
Certainly the Republic will not be restored by making government even bigger.
I am not sure what they would propose to do about it, but a public broadcasting network would be the least radical of solutions that could be proposed. I actually think they would pass a law for the immediate nullification of media corporation charters, and sell off their assets, their newspapers and broadcast stations, to private individuals. The law would prohibit ownership of media by corporations.
Our founders were radicals, and would equally be considered that today, maybe even more so.
Our nation's Founders declined to establish a national newspaper, ergo, they would not be eager to create a national broadcasting system. The question of any such national organ, then and now, is who gets editorial control. NPR has shown that friends of the Republic will not always be controlling the discussion, and there's no reason the taxpayers should be forced to fund their enemies.