The only question to which government should be the answer is "who protects the individual?" This was the vision the founders had and sought to construct with the Constitution. Unfortunately, certain among them demanded and were awarded a "bill of rights" leaving us with the hair-splitting idiocy that came with it. Does this right exist? Does that right exist? We have entire generations of people out there who believe the Constitution gives them rights.
I would repeal the 16th amendment, myself, but would add put an amendment to put the commerce clause back to it pre FDR status.
I would do the same, but scrap the commerce clause altogether. I would also remove the Bill of Rights and add a clause to the preamble that defines the document as "that which is not expressly permitted is forbidden". If there is no defined power allowing the federal government to create laws around speech or religion, then they cannot. If there is no defined power to tax an individual, then they cannot.
I would further extend liberty by amendment to protect rights from infringement by US states. I believe this was an intent of the 14th amendment, but the SCOTUS interpreted that out fairly quickly.
I would leave that to the states, personally. If a state has insufficient protection of the individual, the productive among them will quickly migrate to the state where they're better protected leaving the offender to perish under their own dead weight. This was the original design. What we have now is that so many things are "regulated" at the federal level leaving those of us who wish to be left alone very few places to run and hide.
Regards,
Col Sanders
"I would do the same, but scrap the commerce clause altogether."
Oh yes, Hallelujah! The Commerce Clause is the Socialist Landfill.
The very idea that human beings have individual rights not subject to the whims of an earthly monarch, but subject to the laws of Yahweh, is directly from Moses.
Returning to Plato's Euthyphro, Socrates advanced the argument that piety to the gods is impossible if the gods all want different things...
Morality is impossible, because all humans have different morals... Claims of morality is sophistry without some higher power defining what it is...
Morality and all of its associated ideals are rooted entirely in the presupposition some higher power defines what is correct for human behavior.
But, since we are all properly obeying the * modern interpretation * of the First Amendment, good & evil isn't the question... Good & bad, right & wrong, etc., etc., ad nausea; are all inherently religious ideals.
The modern interpretation of the First Amendment (according to the liberal-tarians) says government must exorcise all traces of religion and theism from itself. Therefore, government must never consider issues of morality and right and wrong...
So, it becomes a question of benefits versus costs. Fetus killing has its benefits to society, especially if you like to sleep late on Saturdays. But it also has its costs as well. Society (by which I mean, whoever manages to seize power) needs to evaluate these costs and decide accordingly.
The mythical rights of men and women are also meaningless. The very concept of rights is also founded in religion. Since the enlightened person is freed from any superstitions about some "God," they are free from having to worry about "rights." Only raw power counts and humans are just meat puppets for the powerful...
Was Freudian psychoanalytic theory of sexual stages in psychological development more accurate than accredited?
The Michael Jackson Complex is fixation on mutilation of and deviance with human anatomy in the media. It is a social psychosis catering to the lowest common denominator and generated with Pavlovian behavioral conditioning in popular culture.
Should we really be canonizing special societal privileges in the law based on idolatrous fetishes? Disability, welfare, Social Security, etc., etc., ad nausea...
The social psychosis generated by behavioral conditioning (Pavlov's salivating dogs) in the popular culture and the conditioned response to accept the false premises of mental illness or birth defect will be used as a political tool to systematically rob the public purse. Then, we could have other self-inflicted mental illness and disease (aside from those we already do) subsidized by the government consolidating an ever increasing portion of the economy in the hands of the cultural Marxists.
"...to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them... that all men are created... Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world... with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence..."