The rights of the American People are being violated by those sworn to uphold them. Not having foreseen the recent ascendancy of the federal government over the states (the potential for which was, however, well known and widely debated at the time), the drafters of our Constitution, when amending that document to flesh out the protections essential to the unimpeded and unfettered pursuit of Happiness, failed to incorporate protections necessary to securing fully the Blessings of Liberty to each and every individual and maintaining those protections ad infinitum. In the XIV Amendment, it is written that, “No State [...] shall deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law.” (see here)
While this amendment might have protected the People from overreaches by the individual states (it has failed, as the populations of the various states are continually restricted in the execution of their liberty), it does not protect us from overreaches by the federal government. In order to secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, and to ensure that the individual can decide how best to dispose of the only property (that being her body) without which her life is impossible, the Constitution must be further amended to protect her from indiscriminate and unjust actions by the federal government, against which she currently has little recourse.
Put simply, the XIV Amendment must be altered to read, “No Government shall deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law.” An alteration to this affect (coupled with an aggressive prosecution of the newly altered amendment) would fulfill at least one of the purposes of government as defined in the preamble to the Constitution by securing for the individual, fully and unconditionally, the Blessings of Liberty (liberty means he has the right to decide for himself how best to lead his life), so long as it is made clear to him that he may not not infringe in any way upon the life, liberty, or property of any other person (the flip-side of the coin of liberty that any rational, free-thinking individual will readily understand).
Therefore, unless you have been found guilty by a jury of your peers and ordered by a judicial body (convened to try your case) not to engage in certain specifically enumerated activities (such as consuming drugs in private or growing them for your own use, getting an abortion, gaining or losing weight, getting tattooed, or any other such things that affect your body and your body alone), you have the constitutional right to do any and all of these things. The only possible justification that the federal government might bring for its blanket prohibitions on certain activities and altered states of consciousness is perhaps that while the Constitution prohibits depriving “any person” of liberty or property, it does not expressly prohibit depriving the entire American population of the unalienable Rights set forth in both of our founding documents.
I hereby call upon the federal government to cease with all policies that infringe upon the right of the individual to do to herself and to her body as she pleases so long as she is not infringing demonstrably upon the life, liberty, or property of any other person or persons. The Declaration of Independence states that the purpose of the government of the United States of America is bring about the Safety and Happiness of the People. Until the People are granted unconditional liberty, they cannot ever be truly Happy; until they are granted the freedom to choose for themselves how best to lead their lives, and they are allowed to affect their bodies as they see fit, they are little better off, and just as likely to rebel, as those fine proud Americans who once rose up and threw off the mantle of a government that had lost sight of its duty to those it purported to represent.
Join me in the effort to free the American People from under the yoke of repression; write to your representative in Congress and demand that she or he join in your fight for full, unconditional liberty. Over the last forty years, the People, by continuing to consume whichever drugs they desired, have sent a message to the federal government: We will decide for ourselves how best to lead our lives, and we will not renounce our liberty just because you have declared a War on those Drugs we have as much of a right to consume as we do to partake of alcohol, caffeine, and nicotine.
Ultima Ratio Regum - 場黑麥 John Paul Roggenkamp
30 August 2011
27 August 2011
cattle, not putting greens
America is facing a massive drought. I have been hearing and reading that in the South billions of dollars in crops have dried up, and that whole herds of livestock have been sold prematurely because of lack of cheap or reliable feed. Water, always a precious resource, is neither falling from the sky nor filling the streams and waterways that support human and animal populations alike. Regardless, in the August 22 issue of Time magazine, there is a picture of of a lush green golf course surrounded by parched desert. I do not doubt that hundreds, if not thousands, of other golf facilities continue to operate despite the widespread drought disaster that is threatening the food supply of millions of American citizens.
In national drought emergencies such as the one we are currently facing, golf courses should be among the first entities to lose access to water. Non-agricultural and other such projects not essential to sustaining life that consume massive volumes of water (for reasons including a reliance on water-hungry, non-native species of grass to keep the golf balls zipping along the fairways) must not receive sufficient water to maintain their expansive and manicured lawns when agriculture and animal husbandry are failing. The livelihoods of whole populations (cattle and sheep ranchers, cereal farmers, and their dependents) are on the line, right now; therefore, those among us rich enough to afford membership at golf oases carved from the hard-scrabble desert will have to forfeit water-intensive past-times in the interest of their neighbors' plight. (I am just now realizing the futility of this argument, as the rich care little for the condition of those not as rich as they, and any such restrictions on water-use during a drought will likely be seen as a nanny-state government overstepping its role in society, or something similarly asinine.)
The security of the people of this nation is at risk, and everyone living in this country will have to make sacrifices in its interest. Allowing golf courses to water their massive and, in the greater scheme of things, wholly unnecessary operations violates two of the core principles of the Constitution, those being promoting the general Welfare and insuring domestic Tranquility. The general Welfare is ill served by allowing operations to continue that consume exorbitant amounts of water in order to satisfy the fleeting interests of a handful of affluent individuals, operations that ignore the fact that, for lack of water, crops are failing and livestock is starving in the dust; domestic Tranquility is in jeaopardy of being shattered by food riots sparked by a further weakening of the economic strength of the majority of American citizens who are so poor that they may not be able to eat when food prices spike (which they will invariably do, very soon).
Drought, inevitable and perpetually occurring, affects each of us; we must all sacrifice in its presence. As to my own personal sacrifice, I have ceased with my favorite past-time of contaminating large pools of ground-water with used engine oil and setting them on fire.
Convert your lawns to gardens of sustainable native plants; flush only when it's solid; use low flow shower heads and take Navy showers; turn off the tap while shaving and brushing your teeth; and for the love of Liberty, cancel your golf membership.
We are all in this together, and together, our small, personal sacrifices can turn the dwindling tides.
Ultima Ratio Regum - 場黑麥 John Paul Roggenkamp
In national drought emergencies such as the one we are currently facing, golf courses should be among the first entities to lose access to water. Non-agricultural and other such projects not essential to sustaining life that consume massive volumes of water (for reasons including a reliance on water-hungry, non-native species of grass to keep the golf balls zipping along the fairways) must not receive sufficient water to maintain their expansive and manicured lawns when agriculture and animal husbandry are failing. The livelihoods of whole populations (cattle and sheep ranchers, cereal farmers, and their dependents) are on the line, right now; therefore, those among us rich enough to afford membership at golf oases carved from the hard-scrabble desert will have to forfeit water-intensive past-times in the interest of their neighbors' plight. (I am just now realizing the futility of this argument, as the rich care little for the condition of those not as rich as they, and any such restrictions on water-use during a drought will likely be seen as a nanny-state government overstepping its role in society, or something similarly asinine.)
The security of the people of this nation is at risk, and everyone living in this country will have to make sacrifices in its interest. Allowing golf courses to water their massive and, in the greater scheme of things, wholly unnecessary operations violates two of the core principles of the Constitution, those being promoting the general Welfare and insuring domestic Tranquility. The general Welfare is ill served by allowing operations to continue that consume exorbitant amounts of water in order to satisfy the fleeting interests of a handful of affluent individuals, operations that ignore the fact that, for lack of water, crops are failing and livestock is starving in the dust; domestic Tranquility is in jeaopardy of being shattered by food riots sparked by a further weakening of the economic strength of the majority of American citizens who are so poor that they may not be able to eat when food prices spike (which they will invariably do, very soon).
Drought, inevitable and perpetually occurring, affects each of us; we must all sacrifice in its presence. As to my own personal sacrifice, I have ceased with my favorite past-time of contaminating large pools of ground-water with used engine oil and setting them on fire.
Convert your lawns to gardens of sustainable native plants; flush only when it's solid; use low flow shower heads and take Navy showers; turn off the tap while shaving and brushing your teeth; and for the love of Liberty, cancel your golf membership.
We are all in this together, and together, our small, personal sacrifices can turn the dwindling tides.
Ultima Ratio Regum - 場黑麥 John Paul Roggenkamp
25 August 2011
religious oppression in PA
I have recently been the victim of religious oppression. An inhabitant of the state of Pennsylvania, I was a few days ago in the market for buying alcohol, which I could not do because of the religious laws that have been adopted by this Commonwealth. On Sundays, upstanding citizens of legal age cannot purchase alcohol because it is forbidden in this state to sell booze on that day, not due to laws based on rationality or on efforts to secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, but laws based on the codex of one specific religion (even though the Sabbath, which occurs on Saturday, is the day that in the Christian bible Yahweh says to keep holy, not Sunday, a day not specifically mentioned as holy in that text).
I am not a Christian, but I am being forced to follow its (purported) teachings. I am being oppressed by the rules of one specific religion, rules that have been incorporated into the laws of the state, making Christianity the official religion of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. This state of affairs violates the constitutional right of all Pennsylvanians to liberty by taking away our ability to decide for ourselves on which days we should wish to purchase alcohol for private consumption. Just as women would be incensed if they were forced by the state to cover their heads or to hide their faces out of some sort of religious observation (as the Taliban did in Afghanistan), I am incensed that I am being forced by the politicians and lawmakers of the state of Pennsylvania to follow the rules of a religion not my own.
For some strange reason not rooted in the teachings of Jesus (who himself supposedly performed a divine act at the wedding of Canna just to keep the booze flowing) but located solely in the Old Testament of the Christian bible, religious zealots in this state have found a way to codify their beliefs into law, thus restraining me in my liberty and forcing me to live under the rules of a religion not of my choosing. Additionally, these religious laws force the individual to cross state lines on Sunday to purchase booze for private consumption back in PA, an action that, as bootlegging, is illegal at the federal level because it violates the Interstate Commerce Clause.
In order for liberty to once again reign in this state, all laws based on religious codices must be nullified and struck from its constitution. This must be done in an effort to maintain the separation of church and state, and to forestall the implementation of additional Old Testament directives, the worst of which are found in Leviticus, where Yahweh demands the murder of homosexuals, adulterers, the incestuous, and girls who are discovered, on their wedding night, not to be virgins. The right to buy booze is just one front in the national war against Liberty that is being waged by religious conservatives: laws that prohibit abortion based on the rules of the Christian religion violate the individual's constitutional right to property by restricting her ability to decide to have unwanted growths removed from within her body.
To be the shining example to the world to which we so often aspire, America must return to rationality by putting a stop to this oppression. If one state in the Union is oppressing its people religiously, by extension all states are being oppressive, violating the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution by passing laws that establish religion. If these laws are not struck from the books, and Americans do not regain the right to decide for themselves how best to lead their lives, our system, weakened as it has been by the actions of the greedy and the dishonest, will surely crumble under the continuing onslaught from one specific religion in a nation of thousands of different systems of belief.
To end religious oppression in America, we must obey the constitutional mandate by securing for ourselves and our Posterity the Blessings of Liberty, a mandate that can only be fulfilled when the individual is allowed, unfettered and unhindered, to do those things she deems are best for herself and her body, so long as she is not infringing upon the right of any other person to life, liberty, or property.
End this tyranny. Reinstate liberty among the American people. We will not stand to be ruled by one religion among many. Freedom will ring when the Blessings of Liberty are prosecuted as aggressively as certain religious observances. In the words of George Washington and John Adams, “[t]he government of the United States is not in any sense founded on the Christian religion” (Treaty of Tripoli); let us honor these founding fathers by making sure America remains a safe haven for all peoples, regardless of creed or color, and by fighting to the last against those who would see us dancing to the tune of whichever god they have chosen for themselves.
Ultima Ratio Regum - 場黑麥 John Paul Roggenkamp
I am not a Christian, but I am being forced to follow its (purported) teachings. I am being oppressed by the rules of one specific religion, rules that have been incorporated into the laws of the state, making Christianity the official religion of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. This state of affairs violates the constitutional right of all Pennsylvanians to liberty by taking away our ability to decide for ourselves on which days we should wish to purchase alcohol for private consumption. Just as women would be incensed if they were forced by the state to cover their heads or to hide their faces out of some sort of religious observation (as the Taliban did in Afghanistan), I am incensed that I am being forced by the politicians and lawmakers of the state of Pennsylvania to follow the rules of a religion not my own.
For some strange reason not rooted in the teachings of Jesus (who himself supposedly performed a divine act at the wedding of Canna just to keep the booze flowing) but located solely in the Old Testament of the Christian bible, religious zealots in this state have found a way to codify their beliefs into law, thus restraining me in my liberty and forcing me to live under the rules of a religion not of my choosing. Additionally, these religious laws force the individual to cross state lines on Sunday to purchase booze for private consumption back in PA, an action that, as bootlegging, is illegal at the federal level because it violates the Interstate Commerce Clause.
In order for liberty to once again reign in this state, all laws based on religious codices must be nullified and struck from its constitution. This must be done in an effort to maintain the separation of church and state, and to forestall the implementation of additional Old Testament directives, the worst of which are found in Leviticus, where Yahweh demands the murder of homosexuals, adulterers, the incestuous, and girls who are discovered, on their wedding night, not to be virgins. The right to buy booze is just one front in the national war against Liberty that is being waged by religious conservatives: laws that prohibit abortion based on the rules of the Christian religion violate the individual's constitutional right to property by restricting her ability to decide to have unwanted growths removed from within her body.
To be the shining example to the world to which we so often aspire, America must return to rationality by putting a stop to this oppression. If one state in the Union is oppressing its people religiously, by extension all states are being oppressive, violating the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution by passing laws that establish religion. If these laws are not struck from the books, and Americans do not regain the right to decide for themselves how best to lead their lives, our system, weakened as it has been by the actions of the greedy and the dishonest, will surely crumble under the continuing onslaught from one specific religion in a nation of thousands of different systems of belief.
To end religious oppression in America, we must obey the constitutional mandate by securing for ourselves and our Posterity the Blessings of Liberty, a mandate that can only be fulfilled when the individual is allowed, unfettered and unhindered, to do those things she deems are best for herself and her body, so long as she is not infringing upon the right of any other person to life, liberty, or property.
End this tyranny. Reinstate liberty among the American people. We will not stand to be ruled by one religion among many. Freedom will ring when the Blessings of Liberty are prosecuted as aggressively as certain religious observances. In the words of George Washington and John Adams, “[t]he government of the United States is not in any sense founded on the Christian religion” (Treaty of Tripoli); let us honor these founding fathers by making sure America remains a safe haven for all peoples, regardless of creed or color, and by fighting to the last against those who would see us dancing to the tune of whichever god they have chosen for themselves.
Ultima Ratio Regum - 場黑麥 John Paul Roggenkamp
18 August 2011
on paying the price
During a recent conversation with a middle-aged woman of the conservative mind-set, she said, “The Europeans are paying the price for tolerating Islam.” When I pressed the issue, my counterpart explained that Europeans have been exposed to bombings (see here), murders (Theo van Gogh murder, see here), and extremist rhetoric (see here) emanating from the Muslim communities that have been allowed to flourish in their midst. I tried to explain to her that it was foolish to vilify an entire religion based on the actions of a few of its radical members, but she stood fast, her mind soon locked up in obvious Fear of an impending Worldwide Caliphate.
She was reluctant to offer any kind of solution to this supposed problem, beyond the solutions I deduced by reading between the lines of her general outlook, those being either the forced emigration of any and all Muslims to places outside of Europe, or the sequestering thereof into controlled and separated communities (otherwise known as concentration camps).
In response, I stated that America has suffered also from the decision to tolerate any and all religions, foremost among them Christianity, a religion that has spawned its fair share of murderous and extremists individuals. When pressed, I gave the examples of the 2009 abortion clinic murders perpetrated by a Christian extremist (Dr. Tiller murder, see here), the Oklahoma city bombings (see here), and the marked increase in religiously conservative and extremist rhetoric, including the widespread disillusionment that has lead many Americans (see here) to believe that this country was founded as a Christian nation (it was not – read my blog series No American Theocracy).
I am not saying that Christianity is solely responsible for our country's woes, or that those who believe in it are necessarily bad or dangerous people, although it is true that much of the fear-based and xenophobic rhetoric heard today (see here) and a considerable number of attacks against innocent civilians (see here) emanate from the greater envelope of the Christian religion. What I am saying is that religion requires of the individual a relinquishment of his ties to clear thinking and to reason, and, with its frequent reliance on the belief that it alone is the road to the salvation of the soul and that all others are false roads that lead to eternal death and endless suffering, one can easily get carried away and do something foolish in the belief that one's actions are somehow providing pleasure or satisfaction for That Force Which Cannot Be Named.
She was reluctant to offer any kind of solution to this supposed problem, beyond the solutions I deduced by reading between the lines of her general outlook, those being either the forced emigration of any and all Muslims to places outside of Europe, or the sequestering thereof into controlled and separated communities (otherwise known as concentration camps).
In response, I stated that America has suffered also from the decision to tolerate any and all religions, foremost among them Christianity, a religion that has spawned its fair share of murderous and extremists individuals. When pressed, I gave the examples of the 2009 abortion clinic murders perpetrated by a Christian extremist (Dr. Tiller murder, see here), the Oklahoma city bombings (see here), and the marked increase in religiously conservative and extremist rhetoric, including the widespread disillusionment that has lead many Americans (see here) to believe that this country was founded as a Christian nation (it was not – read my blog series No American Theocracy).
I am not saying that Christianity is solely responsible for our country's woes, or that those who believe in it are necessarily bad or dangerous people, although it is true that much of the fear-based and xenophobic rhetoric heard today (see here) and a considerable number of attacks against innocent civilians (see here) emanate from the greater envelope of the Christian religion. What I am saying is that religion requires of the individual a relinquishment of his ties to clear thinking and to reason, and, with its frequent reliance on the belief that it alone is the road to the salvation of the soul and that all others are false roads that lead to eternal death and endless suffering, one can easily get carried away and do something foolish in the belief that one's actions are somehow providing pleasure or satisfaction for That Force Which Cannot Be Named.
In these times of increasingly frequent political and economic crises, we have seen the rise of supposedly Christian politicos who loudly express their often extremist political views. When we read or hear the rantings of Islamic extremists, we are alarmed; the rational and clear-thinking American should be just as alarmed hearing some of the more radical Islamic rhetoric as he would be hearing the fundamentalist Christian views being expressed by prominent individuals such as Michelle Bachmann and Sarah Palin (see here). Any extremist religious opinion is a danger to society as a whole: weak-minded individuals are easily swayed by those they think are speaking to them the words of some unseen god, and the gullible will gladly participate in violence against innocents so long as they believe it might secure their place, after they die, in some fictitious realm of edible joy and eternal conga lines.
If Europeans are paying the price for their tolerance of Islam, Americans are paying the price for our tolerance of Christianity. But to outlaw one religious practice or the other would be to destroy the fabric of our democracy and to trammel the most sacred rights granted by the Constitution, among them being freedom of religion and, more importantly, liberty of thought and deed.
Pay the price we must, for violent acts by religious extremists will not end until religion itself has ended. To tolerate one religion is to tolerate them all; we are stuck with our extremists, Christian or Muslim, Jewish or Mormon. So if you are worried about Muslim extremists wreaking havoc over in Europe, remember that there are Christian extremists here in America who are wreaking havoc too.
The next time some religious zealot starts screaming at you on the street corner, tell her to take a nap, and to practice her crazy beliefs at home, by herself.
Ultima Ratio Regum - 場黑麥 John Paul Roggenkamp
If Europeans are paying the price for their tolerance of Islam, Americans are paying the price for our tolerance of Christianity. But to outlaw one religious practice or the other would be to destroy the fabric of our democracy and to trammel the most sacred rights granted by the Constitution, among them being freedom of religion and, more importantly, liberty of thought and deed.
Pay the price we must, for violent acts by religious extremists will not end until religion itself has ended. To tolerate one religion is to tolerate them all; we are stuck with our extremists, Christian or Muslim, Jewish or Mormon. So if you are worried about Muslim extremists wreaking havoc over in Europe, remember that there are Christian extremists here in America who are wreaking havoc too.
The next time some religious zealot starts screaming at you on the street corner, tell her to take a nap, and to practice her crazy beliefs at home, by herself.
Ultima Ratio Regum - 場黑麥 John Paul Roggenkamp
12 August 2011
counterweight Constitution
Citizens of America: the Constitution of these States is a covenant we all share equally. Simply by being citizens of this land, we give our tacit consent to the opening declaration of this covenant, wherein it is declared that we are one People, a People with the common goal of making for ourselves a more perfect government. Among the established parameters of this goal are Union, Justice, Domestic Tranquility, Common Defense, general Welfare, and Blessings of Liberty, goals that must, by any reckoning, be the counterweight against which all legislation and other national decisions are measured.
The XIV Amendment to the Constitution guarantees the People life, liberty, and property until they shall be taken from them under due process of law. Blanket prohibitions that restrict individuals in their liberty, foremost among them laws that prohibit the People from possessing and consuming Mood Altering Substances, restrict the individual in her liberty by prohibiting her from utilizing methods by which to pursue her Happiness; they violate her right to dispose of her ultimate property, her body, as she as a consenting and capable adult should decides is in her best interest. Therefore, the Controlled Substances Act is unconstitutional, as it infringes upon the individual's constitutional rights to her liberty and to her body even when she has in no way indicated a desire or willingness to do harm to the property of bodies of other people. It is already permitted for the People to dispose of their property in most any other way, by tattoo or surgery or haircut, by consuming of certain Mood Altering Substances (MAS) such as coffee and sugar and alcohol and tobacco, by entertaining in the mind any number of opinions on religion or morality or social equality, all activities or states of mind that are universally recognized as components of liberty. It would be unthinkable for the government of the United States to pass laws specifying by which methods the People would be able to wash or mend property such as socks; it is just as unthinkable that our government specifies the methods by which we affect our only true property, our bodies, by its enforcement of blanket prohibitions on the consumption of specific MAS other than those socially-accepted ones listed above.
The XIV Amendment to the Constitution guarantees the People life, liberty, and property until they shall be taken from them under due process of law. Blanket prohibitions that restrict individuals in their liberty, foremost among them laws that prohibit the People from possessing and consuming Mood Altering Substances, restrict the individual in her liberty by prohibiting her from utilizing methods by which to pursue her Happiness; they violate her right to dispose of her ultimate property, her body, as she as a consenting and capable adult should decides is in her best interest. Therefore, the Controlled Substances Act is unconstitutional, as it infringes upon the individual's constitutional rights to her liberty and to her body even when she has in no way indicated a desire or willingness to do harm to the property of bodies of other people. It is already permitted for the People to dispose of their property in most any other way, by tattoo or surgery or haircut, by consuming of certain Mood Altering Substances (MAS) such as coffee and sugar and alcohol and tobacco, by entertaining in the mind any number of opinions on religion or morality or social equality, all activities or states of mind that are universally recognized as components of liberty. It would be unthinkable for the government of the United States to pass laws specifying by which methods the People would be able to wash or mend property such as socks; it is just as unthinkable that our government specifies the methods by which we affect our only true property, our bodies, by its enforcement of blanket prohibitions on the consumption of specific MAS other than those socially-accepted ones listed above.
Laws banning the possession and consumption of specific MAS do not insure the Domestic Tranquility requirement set forth in our Constitution, as they do not outlaw the use of alcohol, a substance that in its use is responsible for countless acts of insurrection and aggression, a substance that in its use degrades the general Welfare by enraging its user and reducing his ability to make reasonable judgments, a substance that in its use violates the individual's liberty by often ensnaring her in its addiction and all but forcing her to feed the sickness she has unwittingly brought into her life. Overuse of substances, addictions to substances, especially substances such as tobacco that in its use degrades the general Welfare by ruining the health of the People and leading to their premature demise, addictions are conditions that must be addressed with a logical and compassionate eye, so that the individual can regain the capacity to use those MAS that he decides he needs to facilitate or enhance his pursuit of Happiness instead of being relegated to a prison cell and treated as a criminal for his inability to control his appetites.
Punishments for consumption of illicit MAS cannot be applied to great swaths of the population for infractions that in no way cause direct and measurable offense to the life, liberty, or property of any other person. Just as a lengthy process is required to deprive a person of Life and to condemn her to death, the removal of liberty can be meted out only on an individual basis by an august panel that shall decide that the person in question should no longer deserve specific and enumerated liberties (the penalty for the continued execution of these liberties being tailored so as to maintain the parameters of the Constitution), thus ensuring that her constitutional right to freedom of action and thought is not taken from her without profound and rational deliberation.
A person is not sentenced to death for anything less than infringing upon or extinguishing the Life of another person. Therefore, a person cannot have his Liberty revoked unless he has infringed demonstrably upon the right of other people to their Lives, Liberty, or Property, or if he has clearly violated the parameters of the constitution. The incarceration of non-violent drug offenders whose sole purported violation was to consume or possess MAS degrades the general Welfare and the Domestic Tranquility by removing those individuals from their long-established familial and community ties, by restricting them in their ability to work and to be productive, by holding them in close proximity to violent and dangerous criminals.
A woman seeking to abort an unwanted fetus has the constitutional right to do so. Under the XIV Amendment, she has the right to decide for herself what to do with her body, her only true property, so she may pierce or tattoo it as she sees fit, cut its hair in whatever fashion she desires, eat and let it become fat or exercise and keep it in shape, have her stomach stapled and her organs and cancerous tumors removed, and abort any fetus growing within her female parts. Furthermore, as the Blessings of Liberty have been bestowed upon her, she may decide for herself how best to lead her life; she is allowed to do anything to herself so long as she is not infringing upon the constitutional rights of any other persons (a fetus is a part of a woman's body until it is born, at which point it becomes a baby, or a tiny little person with constitutional rights).
The requirements of a more perfect Union and the provision for the general Welfare are not being met under our current system of top-few capitalism, under which a minority of the People is compensated in the form of great wealth for the labors of the majority of the People. Allowing the wealthiest few Americans to amass such great wealth gives them the power of the purse strings, which breeds corruption and makes these few rich folks so essential to the reelection of political figures that they become the masters of said political figures, dictating, formulating, and influencing legislation to their own benefit at the expense of the vast majority of the population. To provide for our future Prosperity and to redirect the wealth of this nation toward realizing the Welfare of the People generally, it behooves us to alter the fabric of our corporatized and corrupted society, and to seek new methods by which to assure that all Americans might benefit equally of the bounty inherent to this land that is daily brought forth by the People of this nation.
Great bodies of men and women have joined the U. S. armed forces to provide for the Common Defense, and vast stockpiles of personal weapons and other mechanical contrivances stand at the ready to assist them in this task. To provide for the Common Defense, however, we must keep these forces at home, on true American soil, so that, if needed, they can defend the American People from threats here at home; we cannot continue to launch wars of aggression, as we did in Iraq in 2003, to protect or to promote the business interests of a tiny fraction of the population that has a corporate or otherwise monetary interest in the oil fields located in that Middle Eastern nation. There is a role for American armed forces to play beyond our shores (humanitarian aide, protecting innocents, punishing those who seek to destroy us), but it cannot ever again be a war of aggression against another sovereign nation. Many good Americans have died, and much of our nation's wealth has been wasted by intervening in conflicts not our own, in nations not our own, against people who just want to see us leave. Let the chips fall where they may, unless they are huge chip-shaped bombs raining down onto our cities.
Until it comes to pass that all political and government efforts are focused solely on meeting the requirements set forth in the Constitution, and until such time as the rights enumerated in the Constitution are granted to all People fully and without prejudice, the fundamental American documents are protecting only those people who are rich in monetary wealth and political connections; they have ceased to be documents that serve for the elevation of the People generally, and have been high-jacked by an oligarchy that has lost sight of the deep and enduring essence of the American Dream, i.e. Safety, Happiness, and the Blessings of Liberty.
p.s. This is a general appeal to all police officers in America: If you have ever even attempted to trick or browbeat someone into forfeiting their Constitutional rights, or if you operate in a fashion that in any way even attempts to sidestep said rights, and if you have ever sworn an oath to uphold and protect the Constitution of the United States of America, take a good look in the mirror, and consider that you very well may have violated your oath. If so, relinquish your post immediately, and pursue a different career.
Ultima Ratio Regum - 場黑麥 John Paul Roggenkamp
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)