Morality101.net

In the wake of the current political and economic crisis, there are several questions that I have asked that I would assume are also being asked by those who value freedom and individual rights. The questions take the following related forms: Isn’t it obvious to people that what Obama is doing is not going to work in the sense of bringing about economic recovery, e.g. you can’t borrow your way out of debt and you can’t encourage production by punishing producers? Don’t people grasp the implications of these monumental violations of our rights and the loss of freedom? Why don’t people see the connection between history and what is happening now – virtually everything that is happening has happened before in some form? In other words, there is an intense frustration that the consequences of the government’s policies should be obvious to anyone who cares to think about it – yet, every day it is obvious that it is not obvious.

Doubtful that this will wake up very many, yet this is very helpful in understanding the why’s and wherefore’s.

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It is important to keep in mind the difference between a Democracy and a Republic, as dissimilar forms of government. Understanding the difference is essential to comprehension of the fundamentals involved.

Following is the complete article from Original URL

It is important to keep in mind the difference between a Democracy and a Republic, as dissimilar forms of government. Understanding the difference is essential to comprehension of the fundamentals involved. It should be noted, in passing, that use of the word Democracy as meaning merely the popular type of government–that is, featuring genuinely free elections by the people periodically–is not helpful in discussing, as here, the difference between alternative and dissimilar forms of a popular government: a Democracy versus a Republic. This double meaning of Democracy–a popular-type government in general, as well as a specific form of popular government–needs to be made clear in any discussion, or writing, regarding this subject, for the sake of sound understanding.

These two forms of government: Democracy and Republic, are not only dissimilar but antithetical, reflecting the sharp contrast between (a) The Majority Unlimited, in a Democracy, lacking any legal safeguard of the rights of The Individual and The Minority, and (b) The Majority Limited, in a Republic under a written Constitution safeguarding the rights of The Individual and The Minority; as we shall now see.

A Democracy

The chief characteristic and distinguishing feature of a Democracy is: Rule by Omnipotent Majority. In a Democracy, The Individual, and any group of Individuals composing any Minority, have no protection against the unlimited power of The Majority. It is a case of Majority-over-Man.

This is true whether it be a Direct Democracy, or a Representative Democracy. In the direct type, applicable only to a small number of people as in the little city-states of ancient Greece, or in a New England town-meeting, all of the electorate assemble to debate and decide all government questions, and all decisions are reached by a majority vote (of at least half-plus-one). Decisions of The Majority in a New England town-meeting are, of course, subject to the Constitutions of the State and of the United States which protect The Individual’s rights; so, in this case, The Majority is not omnipotent and such a town-meeting is, therefore, not an example of a true Direct Democracy. Under a Representative Democracy like Britain’s parliamentary form of government, the people elect representatives to the national legislature–the elective body there being the House of Commons–and it functions by a similar vote of at least half-plus-one in making all legislative decisions.

In both the Direct type and the Representative type of Democracy, The Majority’s power is absolute and unlimited; its decisions are unappealable under the legal system established to give effect to this form of government. This opens the door to unlimited Tyranny-by-Majority. This was what The Framers of the United States Constitution meant in 1787, in debates in the Federal (framing) Convention, when they condemned the “excesses of democracy” and abuses under any Democracy of the unalienable rights of The Individual by The Majority. Examples were provided in the immediate post-1776 years by the legislatures of some of the States. In reaction against earlier royal tyranny, which had been exercised through oppressions by royal governors and judges of the new State governments, while the legislatures acted as if they were virtually omnipotent. There were no effective State Constitutions to limit the legislatures because most State governments were operating under mere Acts of their respective legislatures which were mislabelled “Constitutions.” Neither the governors not the courts of the offending States were able to exercise any substantial and effective restraining influence upon the legislatures in defense of The Individual’s unalienable rights, when violated by legislative infringements. (Connecticut and Rhode Island continued under their old Charters for many years.) It was not until 1780 that the first genuine Republic through constitutionally limited government, was adopted by Massachusetts–next New Hampshire in 1784, other States later.

It was in this connection that Jefferson, in his “Notes On The State of Virginia” written in 1781-1782, protected against such excesses by the Virginia Legislature in the years following the Declaration of Independence, saying: “An elective despotism was not the government we fought for . . .” (Emphasis Jefferson’s.) He also denounced the despotic concentration of power in the Virginia Legislature, under the so-called “Constitution”–in reality a mere Act of that body:

“All the powers of government, legislative, executive, judiciary, result to the legislative body. The concentrating these in the same hands is precisely the definition of despotic government. It will be no alleviation that these powers will be exercised by a plurality of hands, and not by a single one. 173 despots would surely be as oppressive as one. Let those who doubt it turn their eyes on the republic of Venice.”

This topic–the danger to the people’s liberties due to the turbulence of democracies and omnipotent, legislative majority–is discussed in The Federalist, for example in numbers 10 and 48 by Madison (in the latter noting Jefferson’s above-quoted comments).

The Framing Convention’s records prove that by decrying the “excesses of democracy” The Framers were, of course, not opposing a popular type of government for the United States; their whole aim and effort was to create a sound system of this type. To contend to the contrary is to falsify history. Such a falsification not only maligns the high purpose and good character of The Framers but belittles the spirit of the truly Free Man in America–the people at large of that period–who happily accepted and lived with gratification under the Constitution as their own fundamental law and under the Republic which it created, especially because they felt confident for the first time of the security of their liberties thereby protected against abuse by all possible violators, including The Majority momentarily in control of government. The truth is that The Framers, by their protests against the “excesses of democracy,” were merely making clear their sound reasons for preferring a Republic as the proper form of government. They well knew, in light of history, that nothing but a Republic can provide the best safeguards–in truth in the long run the only effective safeguards (if enforced in practice)–for the people’s liberties which are inescapably victimized by Democracy’s form and system of unlimited Government-over-Man featuring The Majority Omnipotent. They also knew that the American people would not consent to any form of government but that of a Republic. It is of special interest to note that Jefferson, who had been in Paris as the American Minister for several years, wrote Madison from there in March 1789 that:

“The tyranny of the legislatures is the most formidable dread at present, and will be for long years. That of the executive will come it’s turn, but it will be at a remote period.” (Text per original.)

Somewhat earlier, Madison had written Jefferson about violation of the Bill of Rights by State legislatures, stating:

“Repeated violations of those parchment barriers have been committed by overbearing majorities in every State. In Virginia I have seen the bill of rights violated in every instance where it has been opposed to a popular current.”

It is correct to say that in any Democracy–either a Direct or a Representative type–as a form of government, there can be no legal system which protects The Individual or The Minority (any or all minorities) against unlimited tyranny by The Majority. The undependable sense of self-restraint of the persons making up The Majority at any particular time offers, of course, no protection whatever. Such a form of government is characterized by The Majority Omnipotent and Unlimited. This is true, for example, of the Representative Democracy of Great Britain; because unlimited government power is possessed by the House of Lords, under an Act of Parliament of 1949–indeed, it has power to abolish anything and everything governmental in Great Britain.

For a period of some centuries ago, some English judges did argue that their decisions could restrain Parliament; but this theory had to be abandoned because it was found to be untenable in the light of sound political theory and governmental realities in a Representative Democracy. Under this form of government, neither the courts not any other part of the government can effectively challenge, much less block, any action by The Majority in the legislative body, no matter how arbitrary, tyrannous, or totalitarian they might become in practice. The parliamentary system of Great Britain is a perfect example of Representative Democracy and of the potential tyranny inherent in its system of Unlimited Rule by Omnipotent Majority. This pertains only to the potential, to the theory, involved; governmental practices there are irrelevant to this discussion.

Madison’s observations in The Federalist number 10 are noteworthy at this point because they highlight a grave error made through the centuries regarding Democracy as a form of government. He commented as follows:

“Theoretic politicians, who have patronized this species of government, have erroneously supposed, that by reducing mankind to a perfect equality in their political rights, they would, at the same time, be perfectly equalized and assimilated in their possessions, their opinions, and their passions.”

Democracy, as a form of government, is utterly repugnant to–is the very antithesis of–the traditional American system: that of a Republic, and its underlying philosophy, as expressed in essence in the Declaration of Independence with primary emphasis upon the people’s forming their government so as to permit them to possess only “just powers” (limited powers) in order to make and keep secure the God-given, unalienable rights of each and every Individual and therefore of all groups of Individuals.

A Republic

A Republic, on the other hand, has a very different purpose and an entirely different form, or system, of government. Its purpose is to control The Majority strictly, as well as all others among the people, primarily to protect The Individual’s God-given, unalienable rights and therefore for the protection of the rights of The Minority, of all minorities, and the liberties of people in general. The definition of a Republic is: a constitutionally limited government of the representative type, created by a written Constitution–adopted by the people and changeable (from its original meaning) by them only by its amendment–with its powers divided between three separate Branches: Executive, Legislative and Judicial. Here the term “the people” means, of course, the electorate.

The people adopt the Constitution as their fundamental law by utilizing a Constitutional Convention–especially chosen by them for this express and sole purpose–to frame it for consideration and approval by them either directly or by their representatives in a Ratifying Convention, similarly chosen. Such a Constitutional Convention, for either framing or ratification, is one of America’s greatest contributions, if not her greatest contribution, to the mechanics of government–of self-government through constitutionally limited government, comparable in importance to America’s greatest contribution to the science of government: the formation and adoption by the sovereign people of a written Constitution as the basis for self-government. One of the earliest, if not the first, specific discussions of this new American development (a Constitutional Convention) in the historical records is an entry in June 1775 in John Adams’ “Autobiography” commenting on the framing by a convention and ratification by the people as follows:

“By conventions of representatives, freely, fairly, and proportionately chosen . . . the convention may send out their project of a constitution, to the people in their several towns, counties, or districts, and the people may make the acceptance of it their own act.”

Yet the first proposal in 1778 of a Constitution for Massachusetts was rejected for the reason, in part, as stated in the “Essex Result” (the result, or report, of the Convention of towns of Essex County), that it had been framed and proposed not by a specially chosen convention but by members of the legislature who were involved in general legislative duties, including those pertaining to the conduct of the war.

The first genuine and soundly founded Republic in all history was the one created by the first genuine Constitution, which was adopted by the people of Massachusetts in 1780 after being framed for their consideration by a specially chosen Constitutional Convention. (As previously noted, the so-called “Constitutions” adopted by some States in 1776 were mere Acts of Legislatures, not genuine Constitutions.) That Constitutional Convention of Massachusetts was the first successful one ever held in the world; although New Hampshire had earlier held one unsuccessfully – it took several years and several successive conventions to produce the New Hampshire Constitution of 1784. Next, in 1787-1788, the United States Constitution was framed by the Federal Convention for the people’s consideration and then ratified by the people of the several States through a Ratifying Convention in each State specially chosen by them for this sole purpose. Thereafter the other States gradually followed in general the Massachusetts pattern of Constitution-making in adoption of genuine Constitutions; but there was a delay of a number of years in this regard as to some of them, several decades as to a few.

This system of Constitution-making, for the purpose of establishing constitutionally limited government, is designed to put into practice the principle of the Declaration of Independence: that the people form their governments and grant to them only “just powers,” limited powers, in order primarily to secure (to make and keep secure) their God-given, unalienable rights. The American philosophy and system of government thus bar equally the “snob-rule” of a governing Elite and the “mob-rule” of an Omnipotent Majority. This is designed, above all else, to preclude the existence in America of any governmental power capable of being misused so as to violate The Individual’s rights–to endanger the people’s liberties.

With regard to the republican form of government (that of a republic), Madison made an observation in The Federalist (no. 55) which merits quoting here–as follows:

“As there is a degree of depravity in mankind which requires a certain degree of circumspection and distrust: So there are other qualities in human nature, which justify a certain portion of esteem and confidence. Republican government (that of a Republic) presupposes the existence of these qualities in a higher degree than any other form. Were the pictures which have been drawn by the political jealousy of some among us, faithful likenesses of the human character, the inference would be that there is not sufficient virtue among men for self government; and that nothing less than the chains of despotism can restrain them from destroying and devouring one another.” (Emphasis added.)

It is noteworthy here that the above discussion, though brief, is sufficient to indicate the reasons why the label “Republic” has been misapplied in other countries to other and different forms of government throughout history. It has been greatly misunderstood and widely misused–for example as long ago as the time of Plato, when he wrote his celebrated volume, The Republic; in which he did not discuss anything governmental even remotely resembling–having essential characteristics of–a genuine Republic. Frequent reference is to be found, in the writings of the period of the framing of the Constitution for instance, to “the ancient republics,” but in any such connection the term was used loosely–by way of contrast to a monarchy or to a Direct Democracy–often using the term in the sense merely of a system of Rule-by-Law featuring Representative government; as indicated, for example, by John Adams in his “Thoughts on Government” and by Madison in The Federalist numbers 10 and 39. But this is an incomplete definition because it can include a Representative Democracy, lacking a written Constitution limiting The Majority.

From The American Ideal of 1776: The Twelve Basic American Principles.

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This is a followup to America is History which I wrote and submitted to Digg last week.  Our government made a surprising move which is delaying the collapse for a short while, but the collapse is beyond avoidable.  This is my attempt to warn you — protect whatever assets you have as best you can, and prepare for a long dark age.

On that day, it appeared certain that WaMu, then Morgan-Stanley, then Goldman-Sachs were going to wipe out, and the domino effect would follow.  However, right after my original post, Bush, Paulson & Bernanke finally emerged from their caves to announce we were in horrible trouble.  Hell, we knew that, and so did they (well not the sheeples).  So Dodd blurted out “meltdown” and Congress, which had surely also known disaster was coming, finally had to go to work – now that’s different!  The bailout solution presented is horrible!   If our 537 elected officials had done anything right before this housing/mortgage crisis began, this whole dilemma may never have arisen.

This I shall elaborate just a tad more.  The trigger which began the housing/mortgage fiasco was NOT caused by greedy anyone, nor by overpaid CEO’s, nor by inadequate regulation.  It was caused by The Fed manipulating interest rates, which caused first the housing boom and then, after millions of ARM’s had been stupidly signed by sheeples, The Fed raised the rates, causing ARM payments to rise to impossible and triggered so many defaults.  Meanwhile our brain-dead Congress just watched the turds roll by, as they’ve done since 1911 when they created The Fed.

By now you should pretty well know all that, but there is at least one action you should take TODAY (because time is fleeting!), an email complaint to your congressmen – this site makes it quite easy and you can/should edit their form prose to say what YOU think!  America is in collapse way beyond recovery, hell we might as well say goodbye now.

Just this morning we got a really shocking revelation started it’s rounds on Digg (if you wish to promote and comment).  THEY KNEW this was coming months ago.  Ahhhhh, NOW we get the news!

Well, Congress is now battling not only about the original language, but also trying to add all sorts of riders to the bill.  Those riders are largely from socialist Democrats, and I heard this woman on the TV insisting on even more dictatorial riders, so I went to see who the hell that was, and sho’ nuf, it was Hillary!  If a bunch of these riders should pass, the $700 billion cost-guess will mushroom to the stratosphere.  Actually, ANY bailout bill will make everything worse, not better.  For those who get hurt in the process, well gee, you did it to yourselves, deal with it!

Every time that Congress spends our stolen tax-dollars, some entity, corporate or person, gets a benefit at the your expense.  They call it transfer payments, aka robbing Peter to pay Paul.  Paul gets the benefit, while Peter gets the shaft. The only moral and Constitutional exception is defense (note that I did not say offense).

Again as I have said often, the root cause bringing our collapse is our failure to insist on basic morality — the right to life and the right to sustain that life and to maximize our happiness.  I hope you will read enough while you are here to grasp how simple it could be!  Maybe you would also like to come back from the dark age?  If there is a next time, this is the foundation to do it right.

George Bush along with the president of France and 4 other nations, sent to the Iranian government a new proposal of economic incentives, in order to get them to stop trying to build the “bomb”. Of course the Iranians rejected the offer from the start, and moves all sides in the dispute closer to a military confrontation. There are those in the political arena who have publicly stated, that before George Bush leaves office, his administration will bomb Iran’s nuclear facilities.

A nuclear Iran would be a rogue atomic power, with no inhibitions over bombing Israel, and would become the start of WWIII, You can be sure Israel would turn Tehran into an ocean of glass, and would ultimately bring the other great superpowers into the fray.

There are those who would hide there heads in the sand, just as Neville Chamberlin did, in dealing with Adolph Hitler. Of course 6 years later, and approximately 60 million dead, proved to the world that appeasement only produces more death in the end. The question at this time is, would a preemptive strike against Iran stop their mad plunge into worldwide destruction.

The president of Iran has stated publicly, that, “if you bomb us, you will open up the gates of hell”, and one can only surmise such a statement, if true, would entail a full military confrontation between various superpowers, however unprovoked, but become a reality with the use of any atomic weapons.

I can only imagine, the price of crude oil, would become mind boggling, and if the Strait of Hormuz, should become unusable or blocked, would shut the western economies down, along with the emerging asian conglomerates. So much is depending on these oil producing countries, that, in a word, the rest of the world would be held hostage to the growing calamity.

If you think $4 a gallon is tough now, try $12 or $18 dollars a gallon, and in such an event, half of the world would starve to death, over lack of energy to grow food.

Such a scenario seems far fetched, but all too real when you look at the players.

Once again it comes down to the price of crude, when we should be focusing our efforts toward creating a viable superconductor, design our machines that use oil, to run for long lengths of time using very little oil, and using nuclear energy to take the impetus away, from using so much oil.

Yet, there are those, confronted by these realities, who would rather hide their heads in the sand, and pretend it will never happen. Neither did the holocost, or the black plague, but I suggest, you look at the record of history, and then try to understand what appeasement created, otherwise, take a good long look at your children before they go to bed tonight, and ask yourself, will they live a full and good life, or will it end at a young age of starvation and misery.

Yes indeed, this is getting a bit off my beaten path, but is surely related in a different way.  This issue has churned around in the back of my little head for some years now, and now I guess it’s time.

The trigger was reading that the USA has 5% of it’s population in prison, and that is the highest percentage of any country in this whole WORLD!  (so this is a “free country”, huh?)

Five percent of 330-some million people, geez, that 16,5 million prisoners in our “free country”!  All those prisoners cost the remainder of we “free” citizens $30,000 each per year.  My calculator doesn’t have enough digits to compute the total, but it’s humungous!

My purpose here was not to look at the reasons for so many being in jail, that would be for another post another day, and will take some further research, as have all my writings here.  But “crimes without victims” certainly do count up.  Now I’m not into drugs, but both drug-dealers and drug users are many amongst those filling our jails to overflowing. I don’t see the users as “criminals”, and they should not be in jail.  However, I also disagree with the bleeding hearts that we have some responsibility for the rehab of drug-users.  Drug users are responsible unto themselves for the consequences of their own choices.  If those are minors, their parents are responsible; the taxpayers are not.

But back to my purpose.  Obviously the total number of real criminals is much smaller, and eliminating those convicted of crimes without victims would help alleviate the burden.  Surely there are others who don’t belong in prison, but that still leave a huge prison population.  Why do the bleeding hearts prevail, protecting the criminals who have been so violent or stealing from the good citizens?  So how to we refuse to support the baddies and zero the bill?

Whatever I should choose to say from here on is largely brainstorming.  I’d doing this because we need solutions based on freedom, and we need to have ideas on the table from which to build solutions.  So we need some fresh perspective, because what we’re doing does not work, it does not reform, and does not rehabilitate, so those are bad ideas we need to abandon.

Question 1:  Does the criminal owe a penalty to “the State”, or rather, to his victims?  Can we turn the criminal over to his victims, and let them determine the penalty, and to own the criminal’s life until the debt be repaid?  Of course we can, and I believe we should.

Question 2:  Should the criminal, once convicted, be held responsible for the value of damages he caused, or the life he took, or the cost of his trial?  Of course he should.

Question 3:  Are we (the ‘public’) responsible in any way for the care and feeding of criminals or for the welfare of criminals?  Do you have the guts and honesty to answer NO?

So do we build them prisons, and furnish utilities and guards and food and libraries and food?  Of course we don’t.  All we need do is prevent those criminals, who possess traits dangerous to others, from disappearing back into private society to repeat their dastardly deeds.

As we get from history, Australia was populated by England shipping it’s criminals there, dropping them off the boat, and leaving them to fend for themselves.  Have you noticed that Australia has evolved into a fine upstanding country and neighbor despite the genetic origins of it’s citizenry?  To a lesser extent, early American immigrant settlers included many of the same, from England as well as escapees from Germany, Ireland, Spain, France and other countries.  Nobody shouldered the burden for these emigrants.  It became necessary for them to find some niche in their new society where they might survive, and learn the necessary social skills and honor by which they could be acceptable to their new neighbors, and go forth and multiply, and prosper under newfound freedoms.  Of course many would have failed in many different ways; probably they did not survive, usually because they were unable to adapt to a moral social structure.  Those are not amongst the heroes of history, neither memorable nor remembered for anything of value.

Such islands today are not available, we can only designate a space where the criminals may park and strive to survive and to heal.  They must pay for the space they occupy, and paying for any of the services provided from outside their environment.  Both the Federal and State governments have huge holdings of such land; there is no shortages of land which might render this unfeasible.  If they wish to escape the sun or the snow or the wind, they can and must build their hut or cave as they see fit, and cooperate with others of their kind to create a social order in which they might survive progress.  They can do all these things only by producing within the free market, trading for goods and services, and learning how to survive and prosper by being responsible for themselves and cooperating with their fellowmen.  Their refusal or failure to learn these necessary moral postures might result in their death, but that would be of their own choosing, and is a social responsibility of anyone not directly involved.

At some point I may come back to this page to fine-tune and/or elaborate, but for now I want to publish this and get some action or reaction, either way.  We are all feeling our way on this issue.  Thank you.