If George Bush hired him, he can do whatever he damn well pleases with the reports
Bush didn't hire him, he's been working at NASA since 1967. Even then, Bush doesn't pay this guy. Congress does.
What this sounds like to me is an attempt to unofficially pressure him withhold his opinion outside of NASA buisness. This administrations seems to be able to get very far by extending plausible deniablity to the realm of policy. They exert pressure unofficialy then back off and say "no we didn't," and it seems to work most of the time.
If you want another demonstration of this in action, the NYT published a very detailed story about US policy in Haiti over the last several years.
The authors argue, successfully in my opinion, that a legislative act, passed by Congress, CANNOT limit the constitutionally derived powers granted to the executive branch.
The situation is a little more murky than that. Congress is constitutionally granted the power to declare war and the allocate funding for waging war. Since WWII the US has bassically avoided declaring war, this side steps the constitutional check on the presidents ability to wage war. In response to this developmet, especially in Vietnam, Congress passed the War Powers Resolution. This law attemptes to limit the president power:
The constitutional powers of the President as Commander-in-Chief to introduce United States Armed Forces into hostilities, or into situations where imminent involvement in hostilities is clearly indicated by the circumstances, are exercised only pursuant to (1) a declaration of war, (2) specific statutory authorization, or (3) a national emergency created by attack upon the United States, its territories or possessions, or its armed forces.
Additionally the law requires that the US forces withdraw from any such situation with 60 days unless congress aproves a use of force resolution.
At present this has never been challanged because congress has authorized force in every instance. This creates a situation where the settled law as to the powers of the president as commander-in-chief is murky. This administration is holding that congress cannot limit it's power this way. congress is holding that it can, and has. The only way this is going to be decided is if a) one side sues the other and the sumpreme court settles it or b) congress impeaches the president for violating it's laws. Either situation would create some sort of precedent beyond the scattering of appelate court decisions which your article sites.
With respect to wiretapping, the court has held that there isn't really any constitutional prohibition of wiretaps for national securities purposes. That doesn't mean that congress can't decide to limit the FBI, CIA or NSA's power to utilize these wiretaps. And since the exact boudary between executive and legaslative power isn't clear here and congress has specifically refused to grant the president these powers it's very possible that they may be illegal.
Beyond the narrow issue of these wiretaps however is the much larger issue of who exactly controls America's non-military organs of foriegn policy. To bring this back ot civics 101, congress has the power of the power of purse over just about everything in addition to the fact that the entire federal buracracy follows laws passed by congress. The president is supposed to implement these laws, even when he doesn't agree with them (such as a veto-override). This administration is stating that the executive has a much larger control over executive functions of the buracracy and has a much broader authority to interperet congresional derectives (laws and allocation of funding) than previos practice would suggest.
I don't believe that this issue really involves the constitutionality of this presidents actions. Instead it's about the constitutionality of the president ignoring congress.
Just because they informed a few congresional leaders and the head of FISA that they were implementing this program does not mean they are clearing any of the actions taken under this program with anyone. Briefing != oversight. In fact according the the NYT article, the judge overseeing FISA complained about how the information was being used in mid-2004.
My problem with REAL ID is that I want people on the roads to be reasonably competent and,ideally, insured. Denying them Driver's licenses doesn't keep them off the roads. The way I see is that Drivers licenses insure some minimal amount of competency.
The US report gave a sample of cars travelling the next day at approximatlly the same time. The average speed was ~46 MPH. Also you should be aware that there was about 300 meters of open road in front of the check point. To repeat: this whole incident occured in less than the time it would take for a car traveling at 50 MPH to travel 300 meters. If the driver was distracted (talking on his cellphone) it is entirely reasonable that he would be slower to react than the US forces wanted him to be.
Also, the report states that there was no written procedure for the type of operation, that the signs they normally employed at their old posting were not availible and the troops were getting jumpy becuase they had been left deployed in one position for a while - which is just asking for a attack.
Personally I ascribe no malice to the troops actions. But the lack of communication, planning or equipment clear makes the US forces in general responisble for her death. The troops on the ground should not be punished, but the Higher up should certainly take some heat for this.
As the article talks about only shooting "unregulated" animals, such as imported deer and pigs I would assume there would be a negligible enviromental impact. It exactlty the same of those hunting ranches which import their game for hunter to blow away(and no you dont really have to stalk it, their in a reasonably small enclosed area).
As for secerity concern i would think it would be fairly simple, you limit the platform's range of motion, and put up fencing and singage around the fire zone, anyone you goes in might as well expect to be shot. If worst comes to worst the owner can always just disconnect the platform from the internet.
I really don't have much of a problem with this proposal, if you want to pay to do stupid things on private property without harming anyone, go right ahead.
I think it's stupid to have seperate national and international intelligence agencies -roll NSA, CIA, NRO and FBI into one and eliminate reduncency.
Okay, roll the CIA, NSA, NRO, and all the pentagon inteligence services up into to one, their more or less redundant, and are supposedly already under one command.
But DO NOT add in the FBI, there is a good reason why the FBI is suppossed to deal only with domestic matters, it's called the bill of rights. The CIA can tap phones, break& Enter, Read E-mails freely, without the need for a warrant, since, supposedly, their not spying on Americans and thus they don't technily have rights in the eyes of our government.
But the FBI is diffrent, it was created to deal with crimes which crosses state lines, everything from organized crime to suspect fleeing across state lines. It now deals primarily with bank robberries. It is a law-enforcment agency, it was not intended to be a inteligence service, and consequently has a much higher burden of proof, for better or for worse, than any national inteligence agency. Would you realy want the CIA to be able to arrest you based on the evidence that they collected? An agency which missed the existence of several Nuclear powers, some terrorist networks, and believed that Iraq had WMDs based upon ariel photographs of buildings, and paid informants from a guy who wanted to take over the country?
Secondly, sometimes there are more bombs than terrorists becuase it is much harder to get wanted ppl into a country than explosives... there fore a radio detenator can be used by 1 person at a payphone, and do the same amount of damage as 10 suicide bombers.
When you join the military, you get an option (at least at first) to pick your career. I assume this group of people chose to be in the line of work or fit some type of psychological profile that made them well suited towards this kind of activity.
first off , these were national guardsmen dranw from a military police caompany, they had no trianing in prison work, and some off the people eh odid apparently had been fired fro varions US prisons for brutality.
To me, after trying to sort through all the hype, it looks to me like intel was the driving force and reasoning behind this. I've seen / read the other reports about the deaths of prisoners and such. I've also seen / read that some involved have a history such as this, etc. If they saved the lives of 500 American soldiers or civilians... Think about it.
Great, lets assume, that the US military is 100% acurrate, that every arrest they make is a guarunteed terrorist/Iraqi gurilla. Lets assume that some of these people had information which stopped attackes and saved american lives, lets take your number and say 500 lives.
These photos, and these accountsare on every Islamic extremist recruiting poster from Spain the Indonesia, and are these allegations helping all the anti-american factions(the taliban, Al Quaida, Hamas &c0). I'd say that the fighters and the support these images are generating will kill alot more than 500 soldiers, not to mention further weakening the legitamacy of any government we endorse.
But the assumtions are fualty, 90% of those arrested are realeased, many of them having been abused, and now most, if not all of them are pissed off at us, if they weren't already.
understand there are more serious allegations, and we've not seen everything. But having a bunch of guys standing with hoods on their heads naked doesn't seem particularly egregious to me. But then, my culture and beliefs are very different than the Iraqi soldiers (yes, I said soldiers) in those pictures.
and what about the pictures of troops manacing an iraqui with attack dogs? and the supossed after picture showing him lying on the floor in a puddle of blood after being bitten?
It doesn't matter how bad what was Saddam did before, anything we do will be likened to him, anything we do hurts us.
We'd all like a democracy in Iraq, but frankly the US doesn't have all that good a track record with this kind of thing (we tend to be a little too heavy handed) America should give them a chance to write out a system of government whichwon't fall apart without US troops.
And finally to the patriot act, my objections to it are not sommuch its powers, but the secrecy it entails, the government should have the power to look at all records, it just has to tell people about it, if they want to watch who takes books out of a library, fine. But allow the librarians to post a list of it.
One last thing, your making a broad distinction that the war in Iraq and the War on Terrorism(or atleast anti-US terrorism) are related. They aren't, look at some more alternative media.
Like Jimmy Carter or Ronald Reagan? They were both political outsiders....
You don't need some cabal of politicians to effect change, you need a bunch of reaaaly pissed-off poeple to walk into capitol hill, sit down, and refuse to leave until the government becomes transparnet...
What, you would decrease the mighty/. effect becuase of mere bandwidth? please, what would happen to the legendary destructive powers of a/. link if they stopped and thought about it!
To Kerry is another Clinton who votes down the polls which is _NOT_ what a President should ever do, especially with the shit the country is going through today...
There are degrees to "following" the polls, some good some bad, personally I believe that Kerry will actually try to do something he believes in if he gets into office regardless of what the polls say, and he will back off something because of what the polls say. It's called political capital, are you going to focus on doing something that's unpopular or something that's popular? If it's necessary you're going to do something that's unpopular and take the flack for it, Kerry might well be able to do that, or he may not. But in any case its better than what's happening now.
Bush is essentially saying "my way or the highway" on all of his programs and is pushing his party into line. This is not a good thing. Our government is designed to argue over things and go through multiple drafts off bills before passing it, now the party lines are becoming increasingly concrete, people are holding the party line more and more in votes, this is reducing the debate and, in situations like this one where one party controls both houses and the white house, its becoming more of a dictatorship.
It's a good thing for people (not just the president) to listen to polls; it keeps the debate going and democracy alive.
Becuase the entire election is controlled by two parties, neither of whom has any reason to want a change. Therefore run-off election are pointless in a two party system. When they let a third party into a presidential debate I'll tak about it, now its just an exuse for the politicians to get a second chance at stealing an election...
heat is not always used in terms of heating the house, think hot water...
Also the use of Hyrdogen as an intermideiate step is more ineeficent when direct solar power is avialable, the only problem is there are these things calles "night" and "clouds" which prevent the solar panels from working.
BTW, weren't there all ready some houses generating electricity and selling back to the grid(I can think of a few in Maine).
also find it interesting (and truly sad) that you think the Civil War was only about freeing slaves
First off I was not referring to slavery, I was referring to the 14th amendment which forces states to grant all rights in the federal constitution, like freedom of speech. The purposes it was originally intended for have little to do with its effect today.
The railroad were not charging different fares for different regions, they were charging different fares from different towns, or different commodities from the same town(charging less to ship corn rather than wheat for example). I believe the goal of the government is to foster the growth and development of America, our as the framers of the constitution put it "promote the general Welfare". This entails creating a climate in which the standard of living can remain standard or rise as well as protecting our liberty.
It should also be noted that the "necessary and proper" clause(Congress shall have the power "To make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers, and all other Powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States, or in any Department or Officer thereof.) Is there for a reason, the founding fathers knew that they would not think of everything, nor would they be able to account for every specific case that may arise, which is the reason they allowed the powers they were granted to expand to continue the spirit of the constitution (this is traditionally referred to as a "loose" interpretations, and was the policy carried out by the federalists, who wrote it).
In particular I believe that the government(note I am not specifying federal government here) is charged with the maintenance of the public space, that is anything that everyone(or many people) uses but know one owns.
This principal applies to schools as well as parks. A universally educated population allows for a stronger economy and better completion for jobs internationally.
You say that you would not let your children within 1000 feet of a public school, I am assuming that it is because of the quality of the public schools in your area. I will readily admit that many public schools are horrible, however I believe that it is better to work to improve the schools rather than switching to private schools, or if there is no hope move to a different area. While educating your children is a good thing, it is just as necessary to educate all children because it fosters economic development. The biggest push for school improvement often comes from corporations who are worried that the quality of their future employees is declining. Indeed some have laid blame on US educational failures for outsourcing tech jobs. Not everyone can afford private schools(and government subsidies work worse than government control), so public schools are necessary, they just need to be improved. This is one of the tasks that the local community should under take.
the concept of a safety net works in a similar way, it provides services that no one else has an interest in. Yes, friends, family and communities (this includes churches) should do all they can, yet the majority of these government programs were instituted when the charitable safety net failed during the great depression.
The principal that the government should do only what the people cannot do is false. Nothing ever runs at 100% all the time, especially people. They do not do all that they can do, and it is the governments task to do everything they won't do.
you speak of protecting individuals from encroachments into their liberty by the government. there is a third group here, which is also encroaching on our liberty, business. I'm not saying all business is bad business, however the most profitable method is not always the best for the people, thus it should be the governments role to act as a agent of the people against corporate encroachments, because some things are simply too big to be constantly regulated by a disparate group of citizens.
Competition is a better regulator than the government could ever provide...
This is not true, there is no incentive for corporations to control power plant emmissions for example, yet it is clearly in the public good.
Additionally not all markets can support more than 1-2 buisnnesses, look at power supply; if one company owns the infrastructure, and refuses to let others use it, then any other company which would ideally be better, but is unable to produce an entirley seprate power-grid, is shut out of the competition, thus reducing consumer welfare (admittitly the current system is not perfect but atleast there is someone there to stop the worst of it).
Another example of this is the pricing of rialways in the 1800s, rail companies charged diffrent prices to farmers from diffrent areas effectivly control most of the US agricultural produce. This is obviosly not good for the consumer. Yes it may be more profitable for a select group of people, but it fials at mimiking the governments goal of encouraging a healthy economy.
It saddens me to see that so many of you think the government knows better than you do how to spend your hard-earned money.
It does not, it is simply able to use the collected monies to produce a much greater effect than a reasonably organized group of people. I agree with many of the things the government is doing, and having gone through public education, relied on unemployment benifits, and drive a car which I know is safe becuase of the governemtn, I am perfectly happy to give them some of my hard earned money.
Oh and by the way, no one fought for liberty. They fought for an end to the British dominance to colonial tax systems, with a helping of righteos ingination over represion of coloial governments. The "liberty" you are refering to was added in to the second attempt at colonial governement in 1791, ten years after the fighting stopped. It was added in to convince a grooup pf holdout states to ratify the constitution. It was not until the 1860s that those same rights where extended universaly at the state level.
Of course, if people really were concerned about sales tax being regressive, they wouldn't tax alcohol and cigarettes, both of which are disproportionately used by poor people.
the problem we have with a regressive tax is that it makes it unduly hard on the poor to survive. If they want to buy luxury goods(e.g. ciggarettes) then they should pay the same as everyone else.
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Bush didn't hire him, he's been working at NASA since 1967. Even then, Bush doesn't pay this guy. Congress does.
What this sounds like to me is an attempt to unofficially pressure him withhold his opinion outside of NASA buisness. This administrations seems to be able to get very far by extending plausible deniablity to the realm of policy. They exert pressure unofficialy then back off and say "no we didn't," and it seems to work most of the time.
If you want another demonstration of this in action, the NYT published a very detailed story about US policy in Haiti over the last several years.
The situation is a little more murky than that. Congress is constitutionally granted the power to declare war and the allocate funding for waging war. Since WWII the US has bassically avoided declaring war, this side steps the constitutional check on the presidents ability to wage war. In response to this developmet, especially in Vietnam, Congress passed the War Powers Resolution. This law attemptes to limit the president power: The constitutional powers of the President as Commander-in-Chief to introduce United States Armed Forces into hostilities, or into situations where imminent involvement in hostilities is clearly indicated by the circumstances, are exercised only pursuant to (1) a declaration of war, (2) specific statutory authorization, or (3) a national emergency created by attack upon the United States, its territories or possessions, or its armed forces. Additionally the law requires that the US forces withdraw from any such situation with 60 days unless congress aproves a use of force resolution.
At present this has never been challanged because congress has authorized force in every instance. This creates a situation where the settled law as to the powers of the president as commander-in-chief is murky. This administration is holding that congress cannot limit it's power this way. congress is holding that it can, and has. The only way this is going to be decided is if a) one side sues the other and the sumpreme court settles it or b) congress impeaches the president for violating it's laws. Either situation would create some sort of precedent beyond the scattering of appelate court decisions which your article sites.
With respect to wiretapping, the court has held that there isn't really any constitutional prohibition of wiretaps for national securities purposes. That doesn't mean that congress can't decide to limit the FBI, CIA or NSA's power to utilize these wiretaps. And since the exact boudary between executive and legaslative power isn't clear here and congress has specifically refused to grant the president these powers it's very possible that they may be illegal.
Beyond the narrow issue of these wiretaps however is the much larger issue of who exactly controls America's non-military organs of foriegn policy. To bring this back ot civics 101, congress has the power of the power of purse over just about everything in addition to the fact that the entire federal buracracy follows laws passed by congress. The president is supposed to implement these laws, even when he doesn't agree with them (such as a veto-override). This administration is stating that the executive has a much larger control over executive functions of the buracracy and has a much broader authority to interperet congresional derectives (laws and allocation of funding) than previos practice would suggest.
I don't believe that this issue really involves the constitutionality of this presidents actions. Instead it's about the constitutionality of the president ignoring congress.
Just because they informed a few congresional leaders and the head of FISA that they were implementing this program does not mean they are clearing any of the actions taken under this program with anyone. Briefing != oversight. In fact according the the NYT article, the judge overseeing FISA complained about how the information was being used in mid-2004.
My problem with REAL ID is that I want people on the roads to be reasonably competent and ,ideally, insured. Denying them Driver's licenses doesn't keep them off the roads. The way I see is that Drivers licenses insure some minimal amount of competency.
Also, the report states that there was no written procedure for the type of operation, that the signs they normally employed at their old posting were not availible and the troops were getting jumpy becuase they had been left deployed in one position for a while - which is just asking for a attack.
Personally I ascribe no malice to the troops actions. But the lack of communication, planning or equipment clear makes the US forces in general responisble for her death. The troops on the ground should not be punished, but the Higher up should certainly take some heat for this.
As for secerity concern i would think it would be fairly simple, you limit the platform's range of motion, and put up fencing and singage around the fire zone, anyone you goes in might as well expect to be shot. If worst comes to worst the owner can always just disconnect the platform from the internet.
I really don't have much of a problem with this proposal, if you want to pay to do stupid things on private property without harming anyone, go right ahead.
Okay, roll the CIA, NSA, NRO, and all the pentagon inteligence services up into to one, their more or less redundant, and are supposedly already under one command.
But DO NOT add in the FBI, there is a good reason why the FBI is suppossed to deal only with domestic matters, it's called the bill of rights. The CIA can tap phones, break& Enter, Read E-mails freely, without the need for a warrant, since, supposedly, their not spying on Americans and thus they don't technily have rights in the eyes of our government.
But the FBI is diffrent, it was created to deal with crimes which crosses state lines, everything from organized crime to suspect fleeing across state lines. It now deals primarily with bank robberries. It is a law-enforcment agency, it was not intended to be a inteligence service, and consequently has a much higher burden of proof, for better or for worse, than any national inteligence agency. Would you realy want the CIA to be able to arrest you based on the evidence that they collected? An agency which missed the existence of several Nuclear powers, some terrorist networks, and believed that Iraq had WMDs based upon ariel photographs of buildings, and paid informants from a guy who wanted to take over the country?
Secondly, sometimes there are more bombs than terrorists becuase it is much harder to get wanted ppl into a country than explosives... there fore a radio detenator can be used by 1 person at a payphone, and do the same amount of damage as 10 suicide bombers.
Theoreticly, that sway would eventually rip the bridge up. Ever wonder why military marchs "break step" on bridges?
Why admit it as a whole, you could break the country up a little,and it would fit in just fine...
first off , these were national guardsmen dranw from a military police caompany, they had no trianing in prison work, and some off the people eh odid apparently had been fired fro varions US prisons for brutality.
To me, after trying to sort through all the hype, it looks to me like intel was the driving force and reasoning behind this. I've seen / read the other reports about the deaths of prisoners and such. I've also seen / read that some involved have a history such as this, etc. If they saved the lives of 500 American soldiers or civilians... Think about it.
Great, lets assume, that the US military is 100% acurrate, that every arrest they make is a guarunteed terrorist/Iraqi gurilla. Lets assume that some of these people had information which stopped attackes and saved american lives, lets take your number and say 500 lives.
These photos, and these accountsare on every Islamic extremist recruiting poster from Spain the Indonesia, and are these allegations helping all the anti-american factions(the taliban, Al Quaida, Hamas &c0). I'd say that the fighters and the support these images are generating will kill alot more than 500 soldiers, not to mention further weakening the legitamacy of any government we endorse.
But the assumtions are fualty, 90% of those arrested are realeased, many of them having been abused, and now most, if not all of them are pissed off at us, if they weren't already.
understand there are more serious allegations, and we've not seen everything. But having a bunch of guys standing with hoods on their heads naked doesn't seem particularly egregious to me. But then, my culture and beliefs are very different than the Iraqi soldiers (yes, I said soldiers) in those pictures.
and what about the pictures of troops manacing an iraqui with attack dogs? and the supossed after picture showing him lying on the floor in a puddle of blood after being bitten?
It doesn't matter how bad what was Saddam did before, anything we do will be likened to him, anything we do hurts us.
We'd all like a democracy in Iraq, but frankly the US doesn't have all that good a track record with this kind of thing (we tend to be a little too heavy handed) America should give them a chance to write out a system of government whichwon't fall apart without US troops.
And finally to the patriot act, my objections to it are not sommuch its powers, but the secrecy it entails, the government should have the power to look at all records, it just has to tell people about it, if they want to watch who takes books out of a library, fine. But allow the librarians to post a list of it.
One last thing, your making a broad distinction that the war in Iraq and the War on Terrorism(or atleast anti-US terrorism) are related. They aren't, look at some more alternative media.
You don't need some cabal of politicians to effect change, you need a bunch of reaaaly pissed-off poeple to walk into capitol hill, sit down, and refuse to leave until the government becomes transparnet...
Cheney is the evil mastermind planning to tale over the world... hes just photogenic enough...
There you go...
ALL of his books end strangly, look at cryptonomicon, they walk up a beach to go steal some gold...Random?
quoting the Boston Herald can also be taken as a sign of ignorance, its really more of a tabloid than a paper...
What, you would decrease the mighty /. effect becuase of mere bandwidth? please, what would happen to the legendary destructive powers of a /. link if they stopped and thought about it!
I don't think so, I think a reading is a procedural tactic which can be used to draw of the actualy vote, it can be called for but it is not required.
There are degrees to "following" the polls, some good some bad, personally I believe that Kerry will actually try to do something he believes in if he gets into office regardless of what the polls say, and he will back off something because of what the polls say. It's called political capital, are you going to focus on doing something that's unpopular or something that's popular? If it's necessary you're going to do something that's unpopular and take the flack for it, Kerry might well be able to do that, or he may not. But in any case its better than what's happening now.
Bush is essentially saying "my way or the highway" on all of his programs and is pushing his party into line. This is not a good thing. Our government is designed to argue over things and go through multiple drafts off bills before passing it, now the party lines are becoming increasingly concrete, people are holding the party line more and more in votes, this is reducing the debate and, in situations like this one where one party controls both houses and the white house, its becoming more of a dictatorship.
It's a good thing for people (not just the president) to listen to polls; it keeps the debate going and democracy alive.
Becuase the entire election is controlled by two parties, neither of whom has any reason to want a change. Therefore run-off election are pointless in a two party system. When they let a third party into a presidential debate I'll tak about it, now its just an exuse for the politicians to get a second chance at stealing an election...
no more RTFA
Also the use of Hyrdogen as an intermideiate step is more ineeficent when direct solar power is avialable, the only problem is there are these things calles "night" and "clouds" which prevent the solar panels from working. BTW, weren't there all ready some houses generating electricity and selling back to the grid(I can think of a few in Maine).
the increased salinity kills all sorts of marine life, possibling including shellfish and others which are commercialy fished...
also find it interesting (and truly sad) that you think the Civil War was only about freeing slaves
First off I was not referring to slavery, I was referring to the 14th amendment which forces states to grant all rights in the federal constitution, like freedom of speech. The purposes it was originally intended for have little to do with its effect today.
The railroad were not charging different fares for different regions, they were charging different fares from different towns, or different commodities from the same town(charging less to ship corn rather than wheat for example).
I believe the goal of the government is to foster the growth and development of America, our as the framers of the constitution put it "promote the general Welfare". This entails creating a climate in which the standard of living can remain standard or rise as well as protecting our liberty.
It should also be noted that the "necessary and proper" clause(Congress shall have the power "To make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers, and all other Powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States, or in any Department or Officer thereof.) Is there for a reason, the founding fathers knew that they would not think of everything, nor would they be able to account for every specific case that may arise, which is the reason they allowed the powers they were granted to expand to continue the spirit of the constitution (this is traditionally referred to as a "loose" interpretations, and was the policy carried out by the federalists, who wrote it).
In particular I believe that the government(note I am not specifying federal government here) is charged with the maintenance of the public space, that is anything that everyone(or many people) uses but know one owns.
This principal applies to schools as well as parks. A universally educated population allows for a stronger economy and better completion for jobs internationally.
You say that you would not let your children within 1000 feet of a public school, I am assuming that it is because of the quality of the public schools in your area. I will readily admit that many public schools are horrible, however I believe that it is better to work to improve the schools rather than switching to private schools, or if there is no hope move to a different area. While educating your children is a good thing, it is just as necessary to educate all children because it fosters economic development. The biggest push for school improvement often comes from corporations who are worried that the quality of their future employees is declining. Indeed some have laid blame on US educational failures for outsourcing tech jobs. Not everyone can afford private schools(and government subsidies work worse than government control), so public schools are necessary, they just need to be improved. This is one of the tasks that the local community should under take.
the concept of a safety net works in a similar way, it provides services that no one else has an interest in. Yes, friends, family and communities (this includes churches) should do all they can, yet the majority of these government programs were instituted when the charitable safety net failed during the great depression.
The principal that the government should do only what the people cannot do is false. Nothing ever runs at 100% all the time, especially people. They do not do all that they can do, and it is the governments task to do everything they won't do.
you speak of protecting individuals from encroachments into their liberty by the government. there is a third group here, which is also encroaching on our liberty, business. I'm not saying all business is bad business, however the most profitable method is not always the best for the people, thus it should be the governments role to act as a agent of the people against corporate encroachments, because some things are simply too big to be constantly regulated by a disparate group of citizens.
Additionally not all markets can support more than 1-2 buisnnesses, look at power supply; if one company owns the infrastructure, and refuses to let others use it, then any other company which would ideally be better, but is unable to produce an entirley seprate power-grid, is shut out of the competition, thus reducing consumer welfare (admittitly the current system is not perfect but atleast there is someone there to stop the worst of it).
Another example of this is the pricing of rialways in the 1800s, rail companies charged diffrent prices to farmers from diffrent areas effectivly control most of the US agricultural produce. This is obviosly not good for the consumer. Yes it may be more profitable for a select group of people, but it fials at mimiking the governments goal of encouraging a healthy economy.
It saddens me to see that so many of you think the government knows better than you do how to spend your hard-earned money.
It does not, it is simply able to use the collected monies to produce a much greater effect than a reasonably organized group of people. I agree with many of the things the government is doing, and having gone through public education, relied on unemployment benifits, and drive a car which I know is safe becuase of the governemtn, I am perfectly happy to give them some of my hard earned money. Oh and by the way, no one fought for liberty. They fought for an end to the British dominance to colonial tax systems, with a helping of righteos ingination over represion of coloial governments. The "liberty" you are refering to was added in to the second attempt at colonial governement in 1791, ten years after the fighting stopped. It was added in to convince a grooup pf holdout states to ratify the constitution. It was not until the 1860s that those same rights where extended universaly at the state level.
the problem we have with a regressive tax is that it makes it unduly hard on the poor to survive. If they want to buy luxury goods(e.g. ciggarettes) then they should pay the same as everyone else.