Replies

So, you would grant the Fed Govt. full control over with whom or where its citizens may trade.

Article I, Section 8.
The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises, to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States; but all duties, imposts and excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;
To borrow money on the credit of the United States;
To regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several states, and with the Indian tribes;
To establish a uniform rule of naturalization, and uniform laws on the subject of bankruptcies throughout the United States;
To coin money, regulate the value thereof, and of foreign coin, and fix the standard of weights and measures;
To provide for the punishment of counterfeiting the securities and current coin of the United States;
To establish post offices and post roads;
To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries;
To constitute tribunals inferior to the Supreme Court;
To define and punish piracies and felonies committed on the high seas, and offenses against the law of nations;
To declare war, grant letters of marque and reprisal, and make rules concerning captures on land and water;
To raise and support armies, but no appropriation of money to that use shall be for a longer term than two years;
To provide and maintain a navy;
To make rules for the government and regulation of the land and naval forces;
To provide for calling forth the militia to execute the laws of the union, suppress insurrections and repel invasions;
To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the militia, and for governing such part of them as may be employed in the service of the United States, reserving to the states respectively, the appointment of the officers, and the authority of training the militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress;
To exercise exclusive legislation in all cases whatsoever, over such District (not exceeding ten miles square) as may, by cession of particular states, and the acceptance of Congress, become the seat of the government of the United States, and to exe rcise like authority over all places purchased by the consent of the legislature of the state in which the same shall be, for the erection of forts, magazines, arsenals, dockyards, and other needful buildings;--And
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.

I reprinted all of Section 8 because so much of it is clearly rejected by you, as either an over-reach or unenforceable in your self-styled "pragmatic" universe. None of it is an overreach. And none of its unenforceable...despite your fevered denials.

Nor is your pragmatic position on enforcement of trade a legitimate one...putting the rights of all America and Americans hostage to your having first a lower cost alternative to China.

This is UnAmerican. It is a type of betrayal of our Republic which George Washington explicitly warned us of in his Farewell Address.

We have to acknowledge that the Founders had a keen insight into the matters of affairs among nations as well as human nature itself. They knew that nations could engage in economic warfare that is every bit as dangerous to the sovereignty of an independent nation-state as any military conflict. They also knew that individuals could, knowingly or not, engage in economic activities that, while perhaps increasing the personal wealth of an individual, pose a threat to the security of the nation as a whole. So they vested the power of oversight of these matters with the Representatives of the people. To be honest, I still have faith in the wisdom of the Founders to this day, especially if it involves a choice between that and some feel-good globalist mantra.

Nor is your pragmatic position on enforcement of trade a legitimate one...putting the rights of all America and Americans hostage to your having first a lower cost alternative to China.

But it is a legitimate one, despite your recasting into your narrow worldview. You would have the government impose trade regulation that would destroy large parts of the US economy, without any fall back position to take up the slack. You would have the livelihoods of all Americans held hostage to the protectionism of corporate patents. You need to find some middle ground here. You are advocating burning down the village to save the village.

Some comments on your interpretation of Art I, 8:
"To regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several states, and with the Indian tribes;..."

The key word here is "regulate". I asked if you would give the Feds "full control over with whom or where its citizens may trade." If your answer is "yes", depending on this clause, then you feel "regulate" can include complete prohibition. Therefore, the Feds, under your interpretation, could ban interstate commerce between California and Arizona, with or without reasons. Is that your position as well?

Then, we get to a case like Cuba or interstate trade in illegal drugs. I dunno. I think it comes down to the wise exercise of a power. Just because the Fed is empowered to do something doesn't make it automatically a wise solution, which is why I wrote "full power". A power unchecked is ultimately destructive to all it touches.

There is a weird dynamic between the govt. power to regulate commerce and the individual right to property. Each trumps the other at the extremes. How can you have the right to own anything you want if the govt. has the power to ban the buying and selling of things, and vice versa?

"To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries;..."

I see nothing here allowing a corporation to own patents or copyrights, let alone into perpetuity. Only real, flesh and blood people for a limited time. Allowing legal "personhood" to be used by fictional constructs such as corporate entities, is what has led us to much of this problem. In post #56, you wrote about individual traders in foreign markets:

But its all at their own risk. We won't rescue their sorry butts if they lose all their wallets to Chinese or Venezuelan pick-pockets. I.e., their capital investments abroad, are all at-risk. They will be on notice that we won't back them up if they put their money where they shouldn't have invested it.

Why, then, are you willing to protect the corporate interests and risks of MS in foreign trade deals, to the tune of 50% protectionist tariffs?

To coin money, regulate the value thereof, and of foreign coin,

Yes, the US Govt. can arbitrarily set the value of the Yen, Pound, or Rupee vs the Dollar. But, it cannot control the trading in those moneys on the international exchange. If the US set the value of the Dollar artificially high vs the Yen, for example, it would cause Yens to be bought cheaply in the US and sold for more Dollars internationally. Dollars would be overvalued and U.S. debt would rise for every Yen exchanged.