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Try reading the Federalist Papers, or numerous documents the Founders wrote during the debates about the Constitution.

I have all those in a few nifty books. Please cite the appropriate texts.

There's nothing there remotely comparable to "a right to do anything they want to do, as long as they don't harm others." The Founders were not ideological absolutists, or purveyors of simplistic, abstract belief systems.

That's very close to a Lincoln quote, who of course wasn't a founding father. But it's irrelevant. The Founders had a state that was half slave and half free. And it was 1787. You can't compare that with 2007. This is not the Dar al Islam, where 220 years go by without progress.

I don't offer slogans. I offer the Constitution. You offer only slogans which sounds like they came from someone with a mental age somewhere below 20. I'm sure most FReepers would agree with me on that.

How nice. Quite telling that your self-image is so lacking, that you would seek to demean other people, in order to make you feel better about yourself. That's okay. You can have your moment. I'll refrain from firing back (which you would richly deserve BTW).

Of course government should be limited. It IS limited.

Yet you propose a government in which state and local government have the right to control every aspect of our lives, to combat supposed 'immoralities' like drinking or gambling. That sounds... totalitarian, not at all like Reagan. Government is only limited when there are no arbitrary laws against 'immorality'.

Anyway, this thread was supposed to be about Rudy G. and his position on abortion. Do you have anything mature to say about that?

Certainly. Rudy has never waivered from his position. And unlike other candidates, who run from their past, he defends what he did and said in the past.

Am I not correct that the great Rudy G. ran the prostitutes out of Times Square? Didn't they have a right to do whatever they want? This is America; we can't impose our prudish morality about "sex professionals" on others, can we? And Rudy put a stop to squeegee men, who were just entrepreneurs plying their trade. Whattaya know. Maybe even Rudy believes in some kind of restraints. Just not when it involves innocent life.

I challenged you to provide any founding document of the U.S. which says that "they have a right to do everything they want, as long as it doesn't harm others."

You then proceed to dodge, evade, and not respond. Come on, open those "nifty books" and find an answer to my question.

"The Founders had a state that was half slave and half free. And it was 1787. You can't compare that with 2007."

Oh. I guess you're one of those who think the Constitution is a "living, breathing document?" Or maybe that we should ignore it entirely, because it was written by a bunch of bigoted dead white men?

I notice you don't deny being under 20...hehe. My self-image is just fine, by the way.

"Yet you propose a government in which state and local government have the right to control every aspect of our lives, to combat supposed 'immoralities' like drinking or gambling."

Nowhere did I "propose" any such government. I simply said that local governments had the authority under the Constitution to do things like that. Always have and probably always will. There has never been a society anywhere on earth which lived according to your fantasies.

You were the one who said there was an absolute right to gamble or get drunk. When I referred to doing drugs..well, I regard alcohol as just another drug. Civilized society condones its use but regulates it. And no, I never did drugs. If you didn't either, congratulations on having good sense about something.