X-Message-Number: 23119
From: 
Subject: Re: post # 23106 (Mike Perry)
Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2003 22:25:19 +0000

You say "Not universal, but it's thousands versus millions". World wide it's 
thousands (at best a few million) versus billions!

Jefferson's thoughts on 21st century technology and the discretionary income 
of people was not my subject. He wrote the constitution and as I said in an 
earlier post, spoke to the general welfare clause (don't take it too 
literally). What would he think of social security, Medicare, medicade, the 
education dept., H.U.D., D.E.A., A.T.F., F.B.I., and all the other "programs" 
to redistribute wealth and "protect" us that have evolved over the past two 
centuries (and mostly within the last century)? I don't think he would be 
pleased...just my opinion.

"Socialism is more workable than a libertarian system which is nonexistent".
My definition of a "working" system is how much freedom and prosperity it 
produces. Even though the current U.S. system is the most prosperous, don't 
think for a moment that there is much you can do without some government 
bureaucrat "overseeing" the activity in some form. We are not as free as we 
were in 1950 when I was a child. We probably will not be as free in 2050 as 
we are now...and there isn't much freedom left!

So what that a lot of people enjoy the Federal Government being in their 
lives, there were a large number of happy Nazis and communist in the old 
U.S.S.R. There are probably a lot of happy people in Cuba and North Korea. 
That said, we are better off without Nazism, would be better off without 
communism and with the current U.S. government returned to the way Jefferson 
wanted it...small and no where near as involved in our lives!

You say it means something to you that the Feds. can't (yet) monitor your e-
mail. If you truly wish it to remain that way, supporting the parties that 
have tried to monitor it in the past seems irrational to me. The 
Libertarians, without question, are opposed to such monitoring and will state 
that.

Bin Laden's acts are the justification for the Republicans and Democrats 
enacting the Patriot Act. We the people by not marching in the streets and 
flooding congress with nasty letters and e-mails on the subject are the 
reason it still remains on the books.

You say the constitution is interpreted differently by most people than 
strict libertarians. I have not interviewed "most people" but of the people I 
personally know and correspond with, the overwhelming majority have never 
read the constitution or even heard of the Federalist Papers. They have no 
idea whatsoever of what the founders wanted in a government. They (the 
overwhelming majority) think we live in a Democracy and that "the majority 
rules"...some have even used those very words in conversation with me. One 
personal friend, when I pointed out that G.W. Bush's "Faith Based Initiative" 
(Federal money to religious charities) was unconstitutional, responded 
with: "Oh, who cares!".B.T.W., she is a reborn christian. Well, I care and 
she and you should care. We and our children (great Ra help them) must live 
under thr R & D's interpretation of that document...they should read, re-
read, re-re read not only it but everything else written on the subject to 
get a better understanding of what Jefferson, etal meant!

That the issues are clearer on the 1st and 2nd amendments than the rest of 
the document (the Constitution) is an argument in support of my last 
statement in the previous paragraph.

Unfortunately I agree with you on the fate of the Free State Project. I fear 
that only advancing technology that eventually frees humanity from dependence 
on a single world is our only real hope! Best wishes,
Jerry

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