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Politics
Jan 8, 2016 17:06:34 GMT -5
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Post by Jancey on Jan 8, 2016 17:06:34 GMT -5
Rubio ^^^^^
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xdeadlyxmirage
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This Guy
Disrespecting narrative film since the 15th century.
Posts: 1,557
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Post by xdeadlyxmirage on Jan 8, 2016 17:09:18 GMT -5
I think Ray Lewis is intelligent. He's got a college degree from a really good school, great life experience, and he knows everything there is to know about people, teamwork and business. He also wrote (not ghostwrote) a very good book. He's not talking about rational, logical thing when he preaches, as most preachers don't. If you want to learn about using both charisma and intelligence, I suggest you follow Ray on facebook. He posts some very wise stuff, and a lot of preaching too. I would just encourage you to not judge a guy too strongly because he's evangelizing. It's not like that's all he does, anyway. The thing about ghostwriting is, you don't tell people you hired a ghostwriter... |
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Post by Juggs on Jan 8, 2016 17:12:53 GMT -5
I think Ray Lewis is intelligent. He's got a college degree from a really good school, great life experience, and he knows everything there is to know about people, teamwork and business. He also wrote (not ghostwrote) a very good book. He's not talking about rational, logical thing when he preaches, as most preachers don't. If you want to learn about using both charisma and intelligence, I suggest you follow Ray on facebook. He posts some very wise stuff, and a lot of preaching too. I would just encourage you to not judge a guy too strongly because he's evangelizing. It's not like that's all he does, anyway. The thing about ghostwriting is, you don't tell people you hired a ghostwriter... That's not always true. "ghostwriting" in public is very much a thing. But he wrote it. |
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Post by Juggs on Jan 8, 2016 17:13:35 GMT -5
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Post by Juggs on Jan 8, 2016 19:56:00 GMT -5
Those of you who watch cable news, regularly visit social media platforms, or follow the activity of the Tea Party like I do may have heard about the idea of a constitutional convention being thrown around. Specifically, Texas Governor and Treasurer of Bullshit Mountain Greg Abbot released an insane proposal of nine constitutional amendments today, although not really, because most of them either wouldn't be amendments, don't make any sense, or (most hilariously) are already amendments.
If this is confusing, don't worry. It's meant to be. The reason he wrote this the way he did is so that the idiots of the Tea Party wouldn't be able to actually understand it. However, I've studied the US constitution at length in college, and I do understand exactly what he's proposing, even the parts where he doesn't, so I thought I'd break them down for you.
Here's the 9 amendments. They're not in formal text yet, since that looks silly, but here they are nonetheless:
1. Prohibit congress from regulating activity that occurs wholly within one state.
What does it mean:
This refers to congressional power in article 1 section 8 which gives congress the power to regulate interstate commerce. Commonly known as “the commerce clause” this well-known power gives congress the authority to pass laws that affect multiple states at once. Examples include funding interstates regulating businesses that do business in multiple states. Abbot is suggesting passing an amendment that suggests Congress only has the power to regulate interstate commerce, and not intrastate commerce, or put more simply, that which “occurs wholly within one state.”
Why it’s bullshit:
Because that’s already the law! This amendment doesn’t actually amend the US constitution. When the commerce clause is considered alongside the 10th amendment, it’s pretty obvious that the congress doesn’t have the legal authority to do this. They still do, because the Supreme Court has been expanding the power of the commerce clause through decisions since its inception to apply to all commerce, but an amendment wouldn’t solve that problem. The only way to solve that is to appoint justices who would rule against intrastate commerce power. This theme of “it’s already the law” is going to recur.
2. Require Congress to balance its budget
What does it mean:
Most people don’t understand the difference between the deficit and the debt, and that’s crucial to why Abbot wrote this. The United States has been in debt every day since July 4th 1776, and the colonies were in debt collectively even before that. The current debt is great than 17 trillion. It is functionally meaningless. 90% of it is held by US citizens in the form of credit cards, college loans, mortgages and so on. This means that we owe ourselves the money, so it doesn’t collect interest and it doesn’t affect national growth. The tiny fraction of foreign debt is also not concerning, since it improves our credit, which is the gold standard of the world. This amendment isn’t talking about debt, it’s talking about the congressional budget deficit. This budget is the net of tax revenue minus federal spending. Since 1999, the United States has spent more than it brings in in taxes. This also isn’t a problem, but it is marginally more scary, since Congress can start running out of funds for important things if the deficit grows wildly out of control. It’s worth mentioning that this has never happened. We are almost always in the red, but consequences are never seen until congress creates a doomsday device like the sequester spending cuts of 2014.
Why it’s bullshit:
It’s bullshit because there would be huge consequences of forcing congress to balance the budget. The worst thing that ever happens in an unbalanced budget is that congress can’t afford things like farm subsidies, welfare, pensions and the military. If you force them to balance the budget, all you do is bring about these consequences immediately, instead of later, when they could potentially be resolved without consequences to constituents at all. There is no benefit to having a balanced budget, other than looking good. But if you cut important programs to get there, it’s like cutting off your nose to spite your face.
3. Prohibit administrative agencies from creating federal law.
What this means:
An administrative agency is within the executive branch, not congress. The president appoints their department heads, and can fire anyone he wants to in these agencies, unless he relinquishes that power, which he usually does. Congress controls their budgets. Examples include FEMA, the EPA, and the department of education. Federal law is created by congress, not these agencies. There are no exceptions.
Why it’s bullshit:
Pretty self-explanatory. Agencies already can’t create federal law. Even if that somehow happens, passing an amendment wouldn’t change anything, since article 1 already exclusively leaves congress the power of making laws. This is some serious middle-school-level constitutional understanding. I probably shouldn’t even need to explain this, but I do.
4. Prohibit administrative agencies from pre-empting state law.
What this means:
No one really knows, because it’s so dumb.
Why it’s bullshit:
First of all, as we just clarified, administrative agencies can’t make laws. What Abbot means by “pre-empting” is anyone’s guess. I kind of think… maybe… he means that in his fairy world where agencies make laws, he doesn’t want them making laws about things that states haven’t ruled on yet. But again, that just can’t happen. And more importantly, even if we lived in a fantasy universe where agencies made laws, why would they not be allowed to rule on things untouched by states? That, by definition wouldn’t impede state power. Allowing them to rule on things states had already ruled on would actually concede supremacy to the agency. That’s why Abbot is so dumb. Because, even in a fictional universe where this made any sense, it would backfire on what he’s trying to do. That’s proof right there that he’s just saying this so that people will wave their confederate flags and vote for him shirtless while watching NASCAR.
5. Allow a two-thirds majority of the states to override a U.S. Supreme Court decision.
What this means:
Well, it would establish a voting process after Supreme Court decisions to potentially veto or uphold the decision. That’s stupid for reasons I’ll get to below, but the real question is, who does the voting? “States?” WTF? Can you be any more vague? If it’s your senators… than you know that’s just congress right? I don’t think the people who support Abbot or the Tea Party realize that contradiction.
Why it’s bullshit:
Well first, from a rhetorical standpoint: because it destroys the Supreme Court and all balance between the three branches of government. The only significant thing that the Court does is review laws made by congress. If congress (or States, apparently) can override that review, then there isn’t really any point in doing the review. It’s like letting a student veto a bad grade a teacher gave him. From a practical standpoint, again, there’s no obvious voting entity from the states. In order for this to even try to give back power to the states, you’d just need to establish some arbitrary board, maybe like the 50 governors, to vote. But that’s not what the amendment says. As the amendment reads, there’s no one to do the actual voting.
6. Require a seven-justice super-majority vote for U.S. Supreme Court decisions that invalidate a democratically enacted law
What this means:
Currently, a plurality vote (meaning the largest group of votes, even if it isn’t quite 51%), can decide in favor of a court decision. For example, if two justices out of nine abstain from an argument, a 4-3 decision can win. Most decisions, as such, are either 5-4 or 6-3. Abbot wants only decisions made by 7-2, 8-1, or 9-0 (or other plurality derivatives) decisions to count.
Why it’s bullshit:
Because this takes away the court’s power to do anything. Something like 75% of decided cases are decided 5-4, and basically no cases are ever decided as lop-sided as Abbot would like. You effectively render the court useless. The thing is though, that doesn’t accomplish your goal of improving state powers. That just makes congress stronger (since congress couldn’t ever overturn laws via judicial review), which actually would allow the federal government to become more efficient and powerful, which would then cripple the states. Furthermore, the term “invalidate” causes all kinds of problems. Supreme Court decisions do lots of different things, and they’re the only ones who would even be able to interpret whether or not a decision went as far as to “invalidate.” Want an example? Brown v. Board didn’t “invalidate” Plessy v. Ferguson, strictly speaking. It still allowed states as much time as they needed to desegregate, so remnants of Plessy, and laws made under it, were left untouched. It just modified existing law. On a different subject, there is no such thing as a “democratically enacted law.” That would imply that citizens pass laws. Our laws are passed under representative authority by congress. So far we have agencies and citizens passing laws, and we’re only two thirds done. I’m half expecting at least one more group to be accused of passing laws. The president? The Supreme Court? Me? The 1998 Denver Broncos? Officer Barbrady?
7. Restore the balance of power between the federal and state governments by limiting the former to the powers expressly delegated to it in the Constitution.
What it means:
The constitution, although usually hailed as if it’s some kind of bible, is actually more like a structural document about who does what in the federal government. It’s full of job descriptions and powers. This is because it was written to decide who had legal authority in a time when the federal government didn’t have much. This amendment means that the federal government can’t do anything not specifically written about in the constitution.
Why it’s bullshit:
Because it’s literally just the 10th amendment, which is also ignored regularly. The 10th amendment says that congress only has authority to do what’s in this constitution and not legislate itself to have more authority, and that the states get to make laws about whatever the constitution doesn’t cover. So first, I just want to make very clear, this amendment is meaningless. It’s just reprinting the 10th amendment. That however leads us into a much longer discussion about why the Supreme Court has admitted that the 10th amendment is logically meaningless, since issues like drone strikes and abortions simply didn’t exist in 1789 when the constitution was written. There are still a few applications of the 10th amendment, but it’s like 99% ignored. Basically, the only time it comes up is if the federal government tried to force a state to secede or give up power it clearly already had. But that never really happens.
8. Give state officials the power to sue in federal court when federal officials overstep their bounds.
What this means:
This one’s pretty self-explanatory. Let “state officials” (which is way too vague) sue.
Why it’s bullshit:
Because they already can. Also, what the fuck does “state officials” mean and what the fuck does “overstep their bounds” mean? Those things sound nice on bumper stickers and sound bites, but they have no legal meaning. Again, Abbot wrote this because Tea Party folks liked the sound of it. But it’s meaningless.
9. Allow a two-thirds majority of the states to override a federal law or regulation.
What this means:
We again run into the problem of who is voting for the states, but I already covered that, so I’ll ignore it this time. The amendment is basically proposing a new process for making constitutional amendments. It’s saying that if a body of 2/3 of all states agree that a law should be repealed, they can just do that.
Why that’s bullshit:
Many, many reasons. Most importantly, because the federal government could just pass the law again. Seriously. Example: 2/3rds of states repeal the Affordable Care Act. Congress then passes it again, immediately. And then we just repeat? I guess so. You could just skip the trouble and pass a constitutional amendment to repeal the nature of the law. Coincidentally, that also requires a two-thirds majority of all state reps in congress. So yeah, this would just be basically the same thing as an amendment, but unlike an amendment, it wouldn’t mean anything.
Signing off:
I hope this guide to stupidity was helpful. If you have any questions or critiques, please let me know. I realize that dissecting such horseshit can be confusing, so don’t feel ashamed if Abbot spun you around so many times with legal nonsense that you supported or hated these ideas without even understanding why or what they meant. That was his objective in the first place.
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xdeadlyxmirage
NFL Starter
This Guy
Disrespecting narrative film since the 15th century.
Posts: 1,557
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Post by xdeadlyxmirage on Jan 9, 2016 2:01:00 GMT -5
The thing about ghostwriting is, you don't tell people you hired a ghostwriter... That's not always true. "ghostwriting" in public is very much a thing. But he wrote it. Ghostwriting is defined by not giving the person in book credit for it. If they're listed as an author it's not ghost writing. Sometimes people get author credit without ever having written a word, but ghostwriting is more what Tom Clancy and Stephen King do than what Oprah or Dale Earnhardt Jr. do. Edit: I know it's pedantic but eh, I'm going to be pedantic. |
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Politics
Jan 9, 2016 12:50:26 GMT -5
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Post by Morkim on Jan 9, 2016 12:50:26 GMT -5
That's not always true. "ghostwriting" in public is very much a thing. But he wrote it. Ghostwriting is defined by not giving the person in book credit for it. If they're listed as an author it's not ghost writing. Sometimes people get author credit without ever having written a word, but ghostwriting is more what Tom Clancy and Stephen King do than what Oprah or Dale Earnhardt Jr. do. Edit: I know it's pedantic but eh, I'm going to be pedantic. King doesn't use a ghost writer. Get outta here. |
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xdeadlyxmirage
NFL Starter
This Guy
Disrespecting narrative film since the 15th century.
Posts: 1,557
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Post by xdeadlyxmirage on Jan 9, 2016 14:50:00 GMT -5
Ghostwriting is defined by not giving the person in book credit for it. If they're listed as an author it's not ghost writing. Sometimes people get author credit without ever having written a word, but ghostwriting is more what Tom Clancy and Stephen King do than what Oprah or Dale Earnhardt Jr. do. Edit: I know it's pedantic but eh, I'm going to be pedantic. King doesn't use a ghost writer. Get outta here. Yeah, looks like you're right, I vaguely heard of that a while ago, but it at least seems unsubstantiated. Replace him with James Patterson then. |
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Post by Jindred on Jan 9, 2016 15:18:37 GMT -5
King doesn't use a ghost writer. Get outta here. Yeah, looks like you're right, I vaguely heard of that a while ago, but it at least seems unsubstantiated. Replace him with James Patterson then. King has a literal "Ghost" writer. It's why his stories are so spooky!  |
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Post by Juggs on Jan 10, 2016 11:24:43 GMT -5
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