Posted on 12/30/2001 1:25:13 AM PST by NoCurrentFreeperByThatName
Don't take my word for it. Read the Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution, and the Federalist Papers. Then read about FDR and his New Deal legislation, and the "court packing bill" he used to threaten the USSC into coming around to his way of thinking. This is far from "black helicopter" stuff.
Now you have totally left the scope of the conversation.
Hardly. It's all part and parcel of the same thing - abuse of federal authority by way of creative semantics applied to the constitution. They wanted to do something about drug addiction, and rather than leave it to the states, or get an amendment to give the federal government the authority to deal with it, they played word games. By letting them do it, we opened up a whole can of worms nobody intended to at the time. If we're lucky, we might be able to put the genie back in the bottle, but no way can we just let him halfway out.
Here is another diversion. War, the real kind, is the absolute biggest spoiler of liberty, wouldn't you?
I have no idea what that was supposed to mean.
If all you have is a joint, then yes it is a major ripoff. I am even more offended that something that I could easily grow in my garden next to my tomatoe is illegal to grow and roll and smoke. I don't want the government to have license to take my house because a weed grows there even if I planted the thing there. That truely bothers me no end and I've been on your side of the argument when it comes to that.
Posession is a crime, under current legislation, but only outside your bloodstream, because you can't sell drugs you've already taken. Like I said, when they decided to do an end run around the constitution using the Commerce Clause, it became about the the money.
Posession is a crime, under current legislation, but only outside your bloodstream, because you can't sell drugs you've already taken. Like I said, when they decided to do an end run around the constitution using the Commerce Clause, it became about the the money.
Likewise, it's not a crime to have alcohol in your bloodstream, either, except in intoxicating amounts. So, do you think alcohol-related DUI & public intoxication laws are "about the money"?
I didn't say that, just the money. Glad to see you have a sense of proportinality, but it's still a Constitutional violation
Having alcohol in your system is not a crime per se. DUI and public intoxication are secondary offences - ie, driving or being in public while intoxicated. You can drink yourself to death in you own living room quite legally. A minor with a BAC of .10 and a six pack in the car can be charged with DWI and posession. If he's got the BAC, but no alcohol in the car, he can't be charged with posession, even though he does have alcohol in his blood.
As far as it being about the money, can you explain how something can fall under the jurisdiction of the Commerce Clause and not be about money?
As for being in the "Commerce Clause" making it obvious that it is about money, isn't it possible that it's there just to make prosecution easier? For example, the state of Iowa has a requirement that pot, coke, whatever has to have a tax stamp. So, if we can't make anything else stick, we can get them for that (it seems ludicrous to me, but that's beside the point). But, on some level, it's just like charging Al Capone with tax evasion.
So, it's not about money; it's about putting law-breakers behind bars.
See US v. Timothy Leary, where the Supreme Court struck down the MJ tax as double jeopardy.
-- Sure does. - The point now becomes:
- Why do YOU think the the gov was given that non-existent 'right'?
--No such power was given in the constitution. Only socialists believe otherwise.
We might think of suicide, drugged out wackos who couldn't begin to hold a job, or people who eat two whoppers and fries. These are all different conversations though. Surely you all agree that anyone in a prison is not contributing to the country at all and is only a burden, even more so than a welfare recipient, and I know how you loathe them.
- Indeed, - so why does our socialist gov keep creating more 'criminal' acts which jail ever more of our non-violent welfare types? Could it be an almost insane effort to 'control' a flawed process? - Hmmmmm?
Why are cheech and chong any different in your minds than the prisoner or the welfare recipient when it comes to who is dragging down the country?
'We' are always saddled with the loser types. We don't need to spend 25 thousand a year on either welfare or prison in attempts to control them. Left to their own devices, nature does it for us.
The government's goal is to keep the country strong while allowing some amount of liberty. It's a tough balancing act and we see that it teeters all the time.
-- Big of you to admit the rest of us 'some' liberty. - Whatta wonk.
2032 posted by tpaine
You're forcing me to get pissy.
You are only doing so because you can't counter my words above.
Have you ever heard of war? Have you ever heard of the draft. Have you ever been to basic training? Do you ever read anything other than those long haired liberal books, loaded?
I served '55/'58 in the 503/502 AIR, 11th Airborne Div. -- How bout you, wonk?
And sure, I've read lots of 'liberal' books, but not when 'loaded' . [Weird. Who reads drunk?] -- But what of it?
-- Remember. -- I'm supporting the constitution in this discussion. -- You're not.
Why are you offended by the word 'some'?
I'll second that ....
Laws concerning alcohol posession are generally state and local. The difference at the federal level is that alcohol is specifically adressed in the constitution, and enforcement of alcohol regulations is handled by the ATF under the Treasury Department as a tax issue. Drug regulation enforcement is handled by the DEA, which was created under the Commerce Clause. The basis for the feds authority to regulate alcohol production is well defined and explicit. The basis of the authority it claims to prohibit drugs is not. The federal government claims that the authority to regulate interstate commerce applies to a marijuana plant growing in your garden because that marijuana plant might be interstate commerce some day. And that same logic can be applied to anything you own.
And, also, -- if you think that your reply qualified as a response to my comments. -- Dream on.
How do you guys/girls feel about this?
But, the gubmint bans smoking in some or all of them, allegedly in the interest of protecting the health of those establishments' employees.
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