The Establishment Clause
Sean Hackbarth comments on GW's plan to give federal money to churches: [mind]
Some worry about constitutional conflicts, but as long as the funding is available to qualified groups from all faiths, there shouldn't be any problems. The "separation of church and state" argument is a bunch of hub-bub, because no where in the U.S. Constitution is that phrase mentioned.He's right of course. The first amendment forbids the "establishment of religion", which means that the U.S. is not allowed to have a "Church of America". These guys had just fought a war with a country that had the Church of England. They wanted to make sure it wouldn't happen here. So prayer in schools is fine, as long as participation is voluntary. ACLU notwithstanding, we're not allowed to establish atheism as America's religion either.
Still, there's a problem with government funding of churches. With funding comes control. Sure, it'll start with a lovey-dovey hands-off approach. But then will come the little "requirements", which will eventually grow to the point where no self-respecting church will be morally able to accept the money they've grown attached to. Then again, any church will do a better job than government of distributing the plunder. Someone remind me, though, why don't we just let the people keep their money in the first place? If they want to donate it to churches, let them do it themselves.
There's a new issue of The Libertarian Enterprise. It's a week late because the editor had computer problems last week.
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Letter from Curtis Handsaker: repeated in its entirety
below. Makes sense to me. Same goes for voting rights.
I've got an idea. Eliminate the no-guns exception for violent felons. My feelings on this are: if a person can't return to society as a full member, they should not be allowed to return. Call it truth in sentencing, if society wants ten years for armed robbery, then our criminal does his ten and is finished. If armed robbery is such a heinous crime that the perpetrator needs to be punished forever, leave him in prison forever.
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Constitutional Drift by James J Odle - A good screed on the
constitution and why unconstitutional government is
dangerous. Includes a reference to Lysander Spooner's
No Treason - The Constitution of No Authority. If you haven't read
it, I recommend that you ignore everything else on my page today and
go read it right now. He also links respectfully to some more of our
friends:
GOA,
FIJA,
Life Extension Foundation (new to me),
NORMAL,
CATO. Lots of other pointers to good books and articles. After the
Spooner article, if you follow only one link from here today, make it
this story (but follow the other links too, today's menu is superb).
Now, do you see anything here that says that it is the President's job to be the 'Leader of the Free World?' From reading the above it can be determined that the only people to whom the President is supposed to provide leadership to are his subordinates within the Executive Branch and the military. He is supposed to make recommendations to Congress. Do you see anything here that authorizes the President to circumvent Congress and make new law by issuing Executive Orders as Roosevelt did when he banned Americans from owning gold, or when Clinton began to implement the terms of treaties that have yet to be ratified by the Senate?
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As I have explained that we haven't had a president who has confined his actions within the constraints of the Constitution, the same can be said for virtually every member of Congress. The only member who takes the Constitution seriously that I am aware of is Congressman Ron Paul. Congressman Paul has stated that there are two arguments that are completely ineffective in stopping a given piece of legislation: (1) that the legislation, in question, is unconstitutional; (2) that the legislation is immoral. This is indicative of the regard with which our 'public servants' hold their Oath of Office as well as the Constitution.
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A police state isn't cheap, you know.
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The jury exists to defend the defendant from the government when the government is out-of-line. (I know that they don't teach this in law school.) They aren't there to follow judicial instructions like a herd of sheep, else what would we need them for?
bob lonsberry - What I Saw the Other Night at the Movies: Mr. Lonsberry witnessed a "heavy set woman" abusing one of the handicapped people she was supposedly caring for. He called her on it. He discovered later, reassuringly, that this is a rare occurrence amongst those who care for the handicapped. Warm story. Worth the read.
Lindsay Perigo's Politically Incorrect Show - 30 January 2001: Lindsay's been reading William Wordsworth on the French Revolution.
It occurred to me that this could be what we are witnessing here. Through this programme & other forums, the common people are learning words & an idea "not familiar" - non-initiation of force, or the consent principle: the idea that none may coerce another, that all human interaction should be voluntary & by mutual consent. It is an idea at once grand & simple, & certainly revolutionary - even though it is already unconsciously accepted & practised in some aspects of our social intercourse - for to practise it fully, consciously & consistently would be to move heaven & earth. It is a threat to authorities & institutions, many of whom would be abolished outright if the idea took hold.
Declan McCullagh has some great photos of the National Zoo, the Bush inauguration, and other stuff.
Michael T. Shinn at Politechbot - How police handled, and allegedly mistreated, protesters in DC: an account from a cameraman and former police riot response trainer of police violence at GW's inauguration.
To further digress, something is seriously wrong with the police in this country and it seems to be getting worse. I noticed the beginnings of it about 6 years ago with the military training the US army was providing certain law enforcement agencies and police departments with. The police seemed more interested in treating suspects as the "enemy", instead of as citizens with rights, presumed to be INNOCENT. This is a dangerous mindset to be in when you are working with the people you are supposed to be working for and protecting (read: not the enemy). When training our own troops in the US Army to conduct CD operations (riot control) we continuously teach them that the protestors are NOT the enemy. That they are the *very* people you are there to protect.
John Gilmore - What's Wrong With Copy Protection: a bunch of people pointed at the Cryptome copy of this a while back (jg-wwwcp.htm). Mr. Gilmore spiffed it up and put it on his web site. [pournelle]
If by 2030 we have invented a matter duplicator that's as cheap as copying a CD today, will we outlaw it and drive it underground? So that farmers can make a living keeping food expensive, so that furniture makers can make a living preventing people from having beds and chairs that would cost a dollar to duplicate, so that builders won't be reduced to poverty because a comfortable house can be duplicated for a few hundred dollars? Yes, such developments would cause economic dislocations for sure. But should we drive them underground and keep the world impoverished to save these peoples' jobs? And would they really stay underground, or would the natural advantages of the technology cause the "underground" to rapidly overtake the rest of society?
FreeS/WAN is John Gilmore's project to encrypt all internet traffic, thus defeating the wiretappers. It is a free Linux implementation of IPSEC and IKE. [gilmore]
Daniel H. Steinberg at JavaWorld - Macworld report: Big news for Macintosh enthusiasts: Max OS X will finally provide world-class Java support for Mac developers. You can write your application directly to the Cocoa APIs to get a native Aqua interface or use Swing for portability. [cafe]
Scoop at Freshmeat - freshmeat II launched: a brand new look with a new database underneath. Read all about it, with hundreds of comments. [meat]
Keith Dawson at TBTF - Trampling DNS hierarchy underfoot: bemoans the fact that people don't use the hierarchical DNS system as it could be used. With one interesting exception. He agrees with me (or should I say I agree with him, since he apparently got there first) on how to pronounce "www". It's "triple-dub". [tbtf]
WebPager "is a standalone Java application for the win32 desktop platform that provides peer-to-peer remote-control between web browsers through a simple separate window." Tiny JAR file. No source. Growl. Looks like a job for JAD. [cafe]
