The Supreme Court started doing this after FDR proposed expanding the Court in order to pack it with Justices that were more likely to rule the way he wanted. The key ruling being Wickard v. Filburn. The Court has recently been using a slightly more restrictive interpretation of the Commerce clause and indicated that it might be willing to move to a significantly more restrictive interpretation (although that is yet to be clearly shown). It will be interesting to see how they rule on the Obamacare health insurance mandate. On the one hand, if they rule against it (especially if by more than a 5-4 margin) it may indicate tbat the reading of the Court as moving to a more restrictive interpretation of the Commerce Clause has some merit (depending on how the ruling is worded). On the other hand, if they rule in favor of it, there will be no limits on what Congress can regulate (if Congress can force you to buy something, what practical limit is there on what they can do?).
Of course the other interesting part of that ruling will be, if they do rule against the individual mandate, will they throw the entire law out, or just the mandate? Congress failed to include a "severability" clause in the bill. A "severability" clause is fairly common in most large legislation and it states, "If any part of this law is found unconstitutional, the rest of the law shall stand."(or some similar variation).
Unfortunately, it can take decades to effect change that way, and sometimes the incumbent really is far superior to the challenger.
Yes, it takes decades to effect change in this country. That is not a design flaw, the system was designed intentionally to work that way. While it takes decades to effect positive change, it also takes decades to effect negative change.
And yes, sometimes, not often, the incumbent is the best choice. However, if your choice is between two evils, it is always best to take the non-incumbent because it is easier to unseat a single term office holder than it is a multiple term office holder. So, even if the incumbent is marginally better than the challenger, but still not a good choice, you are better off voting for the challenger, because it will be far easier to unseat the challenger, if they are elected, at the next election, than the incumbent, if they are re-elected.
The articles I saw about the petition said that the petition was in response to his calling on Congressmen and Senators who received campaign contributions from the MPAA to vote according to the MPAA's wishes (which was phrased in a way that suggests that the campaign donations were very much quid pro quo).
Yes, I happen to believe that a large part of the problem in this country is that too many people think that they should be able to fix whatever they think is the problem in one, or at most two, election cycles. The system in the U.S. is designed to take a long time to make significant changes. Many of the things that people find wrong in this country took 50-100 years to get to where they are. It will take a similar length of time to undo them.
If the system allowed for quick changes, things would be much worse than they are. It is always easier to make things worse than it is to make things better.
Chris Dodd is no longer a Senator, so impeachment proceedings are irrelevant. As to your link showing that the House impeached someone after they had resigned, that link also shows that the majority of the Senate believed that the Senate did not have jurisdiction because he had resigned and that belief played a major role in why the Senate did not convict him of the impeachment charges.
More importantly, that was someone who was impeached for actions taken while holding public office. You are suggesting impeaching Chris Dodd for actions taken after he left office (or at least that is what this petition was about).
When all you have to vote for is the lesser of two evils, you still wind up with electing evil.
If you believe that that is true of a political race, the correct rule is not to vote for the lesser of two evils. The correct rule is, Vote the Ins, out. That is, if you believe that neither/none of the candidates is a good choice, vote against the incumbent. If the incumbent is not running for re-election, vote for the candidate who is not a lawyer (if there is a non-lawyer in the race).
There have been several studies that show that the longer someone holds an office the less they serve the actual interests of thier constituents.
I just re-read the letter which that quote is taken from. Thomas Jefferson was saying that while these rebels were ignorant and misinformed, they were correct to rebel on the basis of what they understood and that it would be bad for the country if a time ever arose where people did not rebel when they had such understandings of what was going on, even if those understandings where wrong. He was saying that the government must know that if it allows the populace to develop such misconceptions, the populace will rebel. The fact of the matter is. our government has discovered that when the American people of today believe similar abuses of power are occurring they will not rise up in rebellion. Once it became apparent that the people would not rise up in rebellion against the misperception of abuse of power, it was only a short time until those in power, rather than attempt to show the people that they were not so abusing their power, began to actually abuse their power in the manner which people had beforehand misperceived them to do.
Apple's philosophy is that they control the devices they sell. Enterprise customers insist that the enterprise control all of the devices on their network. Apple refuses to design/sell devices that they do not have control over. This is an irresolvable conflict.
Everything you accuse Iran of doing Israel does, and the U.S. gives them billions of dollars in overt and covert aide.
Really? I do not recall Israel (or its head of state) ever saying that they intended to exterminate all of the Arabs, or even that they intended to completely destroy another country.
I am not quite sure where you got the idea that Mexico has light regulation. In Mexico, basically everything is illegal unless you are politically connected and/or can afford the bribes to get the regulators to look the other way (sort of where the U.S. is heading).
Most people who strongly advocate against allowing illegals into the country and/or allowing them to become legal would be perfectly happy with laws that make it easier/cheaper for people to legally enter the country. What makes the problem worse is that the Mexican government actively encourages its citizens to illegally enter the U.S. as a pressure valve to release societal unrest over its policies that make advancement difiicult for many members of its society.
To summarize, most people who are calling for more stringent enforcement of immigration laws would be perfectly happy to accept increasing the quotas on the number of people allowed to enter the country legally. Interestingly, most of the opposition to expanding immigration quotas comes from within groups that favor lax enforcement of immigration laws (I have not done enough study of it to know if it is different subgroups that oppose expanded legal immigration vs those that favor lax enforcement of existing immigration laws or if it is that those groups want to keep the number of illegal immigrants high for other reasons. I suspect that it depends on the groups).
If you believe that the physical universe is all that exists, than you may as well give up. Of course, if you believe the physical universe is all that exists, why do you care what will happen 200 years from now? You won't be here to see it anyway. If the physical universe is all that exists than all that matters is what happens in the next 50-100 years.
Judges shouldn't be accountable to anything but the law.
Yes, but the question is, who gets to hold them accountable? You somehow think that electing judges is bad, but having them held accountable by people who are elected is good. Why?
Which is why making judges an elected position is such a shitty idea.
Who came up with this ass backwards concept?
Right, because making them completely unaccountable to the people is such a great idea. That way when a judge makes a ruling that is obviously self-serving, there is almost nothing anyone can do about it.
Target competes with Walmart on price (usually, just a smidgen more expensive, but not always). However, one of the ways that they are able to do so is that they only build stores in a slightly more upscale area than Walmart is willing to. By positioning themselves that way they accomplish two things. First, they make themselves appear more "sophisticated". People who consider Walmart too plebeian for them are often willing to shp at Target. Second, they reduce some of their crime (shoplifting, burglary, vandalism, etc) related costs as these tend to be lower in more upscale areas (although real estate costs tend to be higher).
Just look at the supermarkets with the self-paying-lines.
Except that there was an article about six months ago about the fact that various large chains were scaling back/discontinuing self checkout lines because they were not cost effective.
If the big supermarket chains had the same attention to detail TJ's
Trader Joe's is owned by one of the largest supermarket chains in the world (which probably would be the largest in the world if the brothers who owned it hadn't divided it into two separate companies along geographical lines).
In both cases, the death of the Earth due to the expansion of the Sun, or the heat death of the universe, you are talking about timescales beyond human comprehension. If you are worried about getting life off of the Earth before it's inevitable destruction by the expansion of the Sun, why aren't you worried about the heat death of the universe? They both happen on timescales beyond human imagining (and are further in the future than the human species has existed).
Nonetheless, if DNA is to avoid extinction we need to start moving now [space.com] as rapidly as we can. Nothing else matters.
Except that just delays the inevitable. The universe is going to end in heat death, so DNA is not going to avoid extinction. I do not understand why I should care about what you are proposing, when it only delays the inevitable by a bit.
I am a spacenut, but proposing space exploration as a way to avoid mankinds eventual extinction is an exercise in futility. There is NO way to avoid mankind's eventual extinction.
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The Supreme Court started doing this after FDR proposed expanding the Court in order to pack it with Justices that were more likely to rule the way he wanted. The key ruling being Wickard v. Filburn. The Court has recently been using a slightly more restrictive interpretation of the Commerce clause and indicated that it might be willing to move to a significantly more restrictive interpretation (although that is yet to be clearly shown). It will be interesting to see how they rule on the Obamacare health insurance mandate. On the one hand, if they rule against it (especially if by more than a 5-4 margin) it may indicate tbat the reading of the Court as moving to a more restrictive interpretation of the Commerce Clause has some merit (depending on how the ruling is worded). On the other hand, if they rule in favor of it, there will be no limits on what Congress can regulate (if Congress can force you to buy something, what practical limit is there on what they can do?).
Of course the other interesting part of that ruling will be, if they do rule against the individual mandate, will they throw the entire law out, or just the mandate? Congress failed to include a "severability" clause in the bill. A "severability" clause is fairly common in most large legislation and it states, "If any part of this law is found unconstitutional, the rest of the law shall stand."(or some similar variation).
If your choice is between two evils, it is always best to take the non-incumbent. If the incumbent is not evil, that is a different story.
Unfortunately, it can take decades to effect change that way, and sometimes the incumbent really is far superior to the challenger.
Yes, it takes decades to effect change in this country. That is not a design flaw, the system was designed intentionally to work that way. While it takes decades to effect positive change, it also takes decades to effect negative change.
And yes, sometimes, not often, the incumbent is the best choice. However, if your choice is between two evils, it is always best to take the non-incumbent because it is easier to unseat a single term office holder than it is a multiple term office holder. So, even if the incumbent is marginally better than the challenger, but still not a good choice, you are better off voting for the challenger, because it will be far easier to unseat the challenger, if they are elected, at the next election, than the incumbent, if they are re-elected.
The articles I saw about the petition said that the petition was in response to his calling on Congressmen and Senators who received campaign contributions from the MPAA to vote according to the MPAA's wishes (which was phrased in a way that suggests that the campaign donations were very much quid pro quo).
Yes, I happen to believe that a large part of the problem in this country is that too many people think that they should be able to fix whatever they think is the problem in one, or at most two, election cycles. The system in the U.S. is designed to take a long time to make significant changes. Many of the things that people find wrong in this country took 50-100 years to get to where they are. It will take a similar length of time to undo them.
If the system allowed for quick changes, things would be much worse than they are. It is always easier to make things worse than it is to make things better.
Chris Dodd is no longer a Senator, so impeachment proceedings are irrelevant. As to your link showing that the House impeached someone after they had resigned, that link also shows that the majority of the Senate believed that the Senate did not have jurisdiction because he had resigned and that belief played a major role in why the Senate did not convict him of the impeachment charges.
More importantly, that was someone who was impeached for actions taken while holding public office. You are suggesting impeaching Chris Dodd for actions taken after he left office (or at least that is what this petition was about).
When all you have to vote for is the lesser of two evils, you still wind up with electing evil.
If you believe that that is true of a political race, the correct rule is not to vote for the lesser of two evils. The correct rule is, Vote the Ins, out. That is, if you believe that neither/none of the candidates is a good choice, vote against the incumbent. If the incumbent is not running for re-election, vote for the candidate who is not a lawyer (if there is a non-lawyer in the race).
There have been several studies that show that the longer someone holds an office the less they serve the actual interests of thier constituents.
I just re-read the letter which that quote is taken from. Thomas Jefferson was saying that while these rebels were ignorant and misinformed, they were correct to rebel on the basis of what they understood and that it would be bad for the country if a time ever arose where people did not rebel when they had such understandings of what was going on, even if those understandings where wrong. He was saying that the government must know that if it allows the populace to develop such misconceptions, the populace will rebel. The fact of the matter is. our government has discovered that when the American people of today believe similar abuses of power are occurring they will not rise up in rebellion. Once it became apparent that the people would not rise up in rebellion against the misperception of abuse of power, it was only a short time until those in power, rather than attempt to show the people that they were not so abusing their power, began to actually abuse their power in the manner which people had beforehand misperceived them to do.
Apple's philosophy is that they control the devices they sell. Enterprise customers insist that the enterprise control all of the devices on their network. Apple refuses to design/sell devices that they do not have control over. This is an irresolvable conflict.
So, are you saying that you believe there is something beyond this universe? If so, what?
Citation please
Personally, this sounds like a use case for kinetic bombardment--drop titanium telephone poles on them from orbit.
Everything you accuse Iran of doing Israel does, and the U.S. gives them billions of dollars in overt and covert aide.
Really? I do not recall Israel (or its head of state) ever saying that they intended to exterminate all of the Arabs, or even that they intended to completely destroy another country.
I am not quite sure where you got the idea that Mexico has light regulation. In Mexico, basically everything is illegal unless you are politically connected and/or can afford the bribes to get the regulators to look the other way (sort of where the U.S. is heading).
Most people who strongly advocate against allowing illegals into the country and/or allowing them to become legal would be perfectly happy with laws that make it easier/cheaper for people to legally enter the country. What makes the problem worse is that the Mexican government actively encourages its citizens to illegally enter the U.S. as a pressure valve to release societal unrest over its policies that make advancement difiicult for many members of its society.
To summarize, most people who are calling for more stringent enforcement of immigration laws would be perfectly happy to accept increasing the quotas on the number of people allowed to enter the country legally. Interestingly, most of the opposition to expanding immigration quotas comes from within groups that favor lax enforcement of immigration laws (I have not done enough study of it to know if it is different subgroups that oppose expanded legal immigration vs those that favor lax enforcement of existing immigration laws or if it is that those groups want to keep the number of illegal immigrants high for other reasons. I suspect that it depends on the groups).
They can serve as a counterbalance against legislators that are always campaigning for re-election.
They can, but what makes you think that they will?
If you believe that the physical universe is all that exists, than you may as well give up. Of course, if you believe the physical universe is all that exists, why do you care what will happen 200 years from now? You won't be here to see it anyway. If the physical universe is all that exists than all that matters is what happens in the next 50-100 years.
Judges shouldn't be accountable to anything but the law.
Yes, but the question is, who gets to hold them accountable? You somehow think that electing judges is bad, but having them held accountable by people who are elected is good. Why?
Which is why making judges an elected position is such a shitty idea.
Who came up with this ass backwards concept?
Right, because making them completely unaccountable to the people is such a great idea. That way when a judge makes a ruling that is obviously self-serving, there is almost nothing anyone can do about it.
Target competes with Walmart on price (usually, just a smidgen more expensive, but not always). However, one of the ways that they are able to do so is that they only build stores in a slightly more upscale area than Walmart is willing to. By positioning themselves that way they accomplish two things. First, they make themselves appear more "sophisticated". People who consider Walmart too plebeian for them are often willing to shp at Target. Second, they reduce some of their crime (shoplifting, burglary, vandalism, etc) related costs as these tend to be lower in more upscale areas (although real estate costs tend to be higher).
Just look at the supermarkets with the self-paying-lines.
Except that there was an article about six months ago about the fact that various large chains were scaling back/discontinuing self checkout lines because they were not cost effective.
If the big supermarket chains had the same attention to detail TJ's
Trader Joe's is owned by one of the largest supermarket chains in the world (which probably would be the largest in the world if the brothers who owned it hadn't divided it into two separate companies along geographical lines).
Sorry, still got a problem with there being no usable energy left in the universe.
In both cases, the death of the Earth due to the expansion of the Sun, or the heat death of the universe, you are talking about timescales beyond human comprehension. If you are worried about getting life off of the Earth before it's inevitable destruction by the expansion of the Sun, why aren't you worried about the heat death of the universe? They both happen on timescales beyond human imagining (and are further in the future than the human species has existed).
Nonetheless, if DNA is to avoid extinction we need to start moving now [space.com] as rapidly as we can. Nothing else matters.
Except that just delays the inevitable. The universe is going to end in heat death, so DNA is not going to avoid extinction. I do not understand why I should care about what you are proposing, when it only delays the inevitable by a bit.
I am a spacenut, but proposing space exploration as a way to avoid mankinds eventual extinction is an exercise in futility. There is NO way to avoid mankind's eventual extinction.