it begins...

[moralist]

I hope the meltdown is not as big as that predicted 2000 world-wide computer crash.

That had nothing to do with any religious prediction.

However, 2001 did... as did 2008.

If this is a pattern, 2015 will be bigger.

Greg

[moralist]

William writes:
Your 'source' has hedged his initial predictions, Greg.

(shrug) Nothing new there, William.

Jonathan has been saying for years that what happens doesn't need to follow any pattern. Only that what has already happened has followed a pattern. So we'll see whether it does or does not.

Rabbi Pastor: "This summer, America crossed the line." Meaning gay marriage.

America did cross another moral line... one of many others.

The definition of marriage has been a bond between a man and a woman for thousands of years. You're a secularist, so the words "sacred" and "profane" are meaningless to you. Which is why you bought into the popular secular leftist insanity of sticking your dick into another man's shit and calling it "marriage".

Fuck all...

You have just summed up the secularist standard of values by which you live, William.



Greg

[william.scherk]

The definition of marriage has been a bond between a man and a woman for thousands of years. You're a secularist, so the words "sacred" and "profane" are meaningless to you. Which is why you bought into the popular secular leftist insanity of sticking your dick into another man's shit and calling it "marriage".

Nice. You really do try to raise the standards of rational discourse here at OL, don't you? I think it is time to take a long break from this forum. Stew in your hate for secular values, reason and humanity.

[Peter]

While Moralist is stewing in his hate for secular values, reason and humanity, but basking in his own moral goodness and divine reassurances and vouching, perhaps he and all others will consider the following question and story.
How big is the underground economy in the US and in the world? Consider all product traded for other products and commodities. Add in all the cash only transactions and all the illegal transactions like for drugs. Add in organized crime and “laundered money.” The following two hastily found articles think it is between 2 and 10 trillion dollars a year.
I was thinking about Greg’s prediction for Sept. 14th , as I was walking the roads of my county for my health today. I heard someone shooting a shotgun repeatedly in one direction about a half a mile away and then a rifle being fired about a mile away in another direction. We had heavy fog last night which caused a school delay of an hour and that moisture also caused a delay in harvesting the corn crop. So a lot of rural guys had some time on their hands around 1 to 2 pm. I thought that was interesting.

The only other secular thought I have is this. Is it more likely we will discover alien life in our solar system and be visited by aliens from our galaxy, or more likely that God will reveal himself to the world? I would say the odds for the first two propositions is 50 percent but the chances of any and all gods revealing themselves is zero.

Peter

Notes:
Underground Economy. Stealth of Nations, a new book about the $10 trillion dollar black market around the world, argues that this "ingenuity economy" is what could save our monetary system. It’s the second largest economy in the world. Within the decade, it may sustain two-thirds of the planet’s workers, according to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), and even rival the United States. But it’s not China: It’s the bazaars, vendors, and informal markets of the world

$2 Trillion Underground Economy May Be Recovery's Savior by Mark Koba at CNBC. Wednesday, 24 Apr 2013 | 9:52 AM ET/ The growing underground economy may be helping to prevent the real economy from sinking further, according to analysts. The shadow economy is a system composed of those who can't find a full-time or regular job. Workers turn to anything that pays them under the table, with no income reported and no taxes paid — especially with an uneven job picture.
"I think the underground economy is quite big in the U.S.," said Alexandre Padilla, associate professor of economics at Metropolitan State University of Denver. "Whether it's using undocumented workers or those here legally, it's pretty large."
"You normally see underground economies in places like Brazil or in southern Europe," said Laura Gonzalez, professor of personal finance at Fordham University. "But with the job situation and the uncertainty in the economy, it's not all that surprising to have it growing here in the United States." Estimates are that underground activity last year totaled as much as $2 trillion, according to a study by Edgar Feige, an economist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. That's double the amount in 2009, according to a study by Friedrich Schneider, a professor at Johannes Kepler University in Linz, Austria. The study said the shadow economy amounts to nearly 8 percent of U.S. gross domestic product.
Much of that money goes into cash registers, said Gonzalez, as personal consumption has risen since the recession. "There is consumer spending in the short term, with people having money even if it's not reported, and that's boosting the economy," she said. "But in the long run, an underground economy is telling us that things have to change."
Shadow economies are usually associated with illegal activity, such as drug dealing. But anecdotal evidence indicates that off-the-books work in today's job market includes personal and domestic workers, such as housekeepers and nannies. "The jobs are in service industries from small food establishments to landscaping." said David Fiorenza, an economy professor at Villanova University. "Even the arts and culture industry is not immune to working off the books in areas of music and entertainment."
It also includes firms that hire hourly or day construction labor, information technology specialists and Web designers. Many who have a job that doesn't pay enough take another one that pays under the table. "We've always had people who make income without recording it, so it's not really new," said Peter McHenry, an assistant professor of economics at the College of William & Mary. "But the fact that more and more people are doing it shows how bad the job picture is," he added. The reasons behind the underground economy's growth are fairly simple, according to Gonzalez. "There's a lot of uncertainly about immigration changes and who will be legal, and about paying for Obamacare," she said, adding that most workers in the shadow economy are in the country illegally. "Government rules are keeping businesses from hiring."
A report from ADP Research Institute states that many employers, especially in low-wage businesses such as retail and food service, plan to reduce workers' hours to less than 30 a week to avoid having to offer health benefits through Obamacare (or pay a fine). "This type of regulation could put more people out of work and into an underground economy," McHenry said. But employers have their own agenda, according to Padilla.
"Businesses are not angels, and they exist to make a profit," Padilla said. "They are going to do everything they can to keep costs down, and if that means paying people off the books, they will do it. The government doesn't really have the resources to track down every business that does this." What the government is keeping track of is lost revenues. According to the Internal Revenue Service, about $500 billion in taxes were lost last year because of unreported wages, versus $384 billion in 2001. "The effects of the underground economy are larger than we think," said David Fiorenza. "The result is less tax money paid to the various levels of government."
"Those working and not paying the taxes puts the burden on those who pay the tax," added Fiorenza. "Taxes could be lower if the government where able to capture the underground economy instead of raising taxes on those currently paying the various income and payroll taxes." Nut the dangers of a shadow economy go beyond dollars and cents, analysts said. Workers who aren't on the books don't get Social Security or health benefits, and worse.
"People who do these types of jobs run the risk of getting exploited with lower pay or not being paid at all," Gonzalez said. "There could be more exploitation if more people are forced into this type of economy."
"Some income is better than none, but there is a reason we have certain regulations in place to protect workers and what they do," McHenry said.
In the end, what's happening below the normal economy should not come as too much of a shock, according to Gonzalez. "People are running out of patience when it comes to finding a job and losing income," Gonzalez said. "So it's not that surprising to have workers take jobs that are in the shadow economy. But it's a sign of how bad things are and how we have to get the real economy moving again."

[Brant Gaede]

Simplify the tax code and reduce income taxes to 20% max--immediate depreciation against earnings and no capital gains taxes. Deregulate.

--Brant

etc.

[Brant Gaede]

Their not mixing is irrelevant to me as I'm neither.

Six days till the next event... and it won't be the last.

Greg

Not the end?

--Brant

nutz

https://youtu.be/JSUIQgEVDM4

Hey! No copying the Bastogne commander!

I read once that "NUTS!" was the sanitized version.

--Brant

[Selene]

Hey! No copying the Bastogne commander!

I read once that "NUTS!" was the sanitized version.

--Brant

Now that would not surprise me.

I found it fascinating to see a clip of Sean Hannity using a convicted perjurer William Jefferson Clinton's statement that he only sent two (2) e-mails in his life as proof that Evita is lying about what was in the 35, 000 e-mails she claimed were only about personal stuff...including frequent e-mails between her and Billy boy...

Citing a proven liar's testimony to prove another liar?

Really Sean?

A...

[Brant Gaede]

William writes:

Your 'source' has hedged his initial predictions, Greg.

(shrug) Nothing new there, William.

Jonathan has been saying for years that what happens doesn't need to follow any pattern. Only that what has already happened has followed a pattern. So we'll see whether it does or does not.

Rabbi Pastor: "This summer, America crossed the line." Meaning gay marriage.

America did cross another moral line... one of many others.

The definition of marriage has been a bond between a man and a woman for thousands of years. You're a secularist, so the words "sacred" and "profane" are meaningless to you. Which is why you bought into the popular secular leftist insanity of sticking your dick into another man's shit and calling it "marriage".

Ayn Rand, the secularist, answers you in Chapter 9, Part I of Atlas Shrugged entitled "THE SACRED AND THE PROFANE."

--Brant

[moralist]

Ayn Rand, the secularist...

Ayn Rand was no mere secularist.

She was an Objectivist who recognized an objective reality greater than herself.

Greg

[Brant Gaede]

Of course she did. If she hadn't she'd have been bored to tears.

--Brant

gotta use them brain cells

[moralist]

Peter writes:

"While Moralist is stewing in his hate for secular values, reason and humanity..."

AIDS is just one result of your secular values, Peter... and that's both unreasonable and inhumane.

And it's not hate...

Understanding the consequences of stepping off of a cliff isn't hating the cliff. It's just not stepping off because there is no inclination to do so. Those who freely choose to step off the cliff get the consequences of their actions.

Greg

[Peter]

Greg! You arse. That is a low blow. More of the same. Whew. That's all the double entendre’s I can come up with in thirty seconds. Aids isn't caused by secularism. It's mostly caused by sexual contact and the world's biggest hypocrites are Christians. I heard that clerk who refused to service two homos was married three times and is probably working on number four with Mike Huckabee. How sanctimonious and biblical. And how many people did Moses murder and then steal their wives?

Your biggest error is confusing / conflating moral behavior with your personal interpretation of some made up bullshit, which is interpreted differently by other air heads.
Peter

A reprint of an oldie but goody from Bill Dwyer:
To my Christian Brothers and Sisters,
As a new Christian, thank you for doing so much to educate people regarding God's Law. I have learned a great deal here, and I try to share that knowledge with as many people as I can. When someone tries to defend the homosexual lifestyle, for example, I simply remind him that Leviticus 18:22 clearly states it to be an abomination. End of debate. I do need some advice from you, however, regarding some of the specific laws and how to best follow them.

a) My uncle has a farm. He violates Lev 19:19 by planting two different crops in the same field, as does his wife by wearing garments made of two different kinds of thread (cotton/polyester blend). He also tends to curse and blaspheme a lot. Is it really necessary that we go to all the trouble of getting the whole town together to stone them? (Lev 24:10-16) Couldn't we just burn them to death at a private family affair like we do with people who sleep with their in-laws? (Lev. 20:14)

b) Lev. 25:44 states that I may indeed possess slaves, both male and female, provided they are purchased from neighboring nations. A friend of mine claims that this applies to Mexicans, but not Canadians. Can you clarify? Why can't I own Canadians?

c) I would like to sell my daughter into slavery, as sanctioned in Exodus 21:7. In this day and age, what do you think would be a fair price for her?

d) I have a neighbor who insists on working on the Sabbath. Exodus 35:2 clearly states he should be put to death. Am I morally obligated to kill him myself?

e) Lev 21:20 states that I may not approach the altar of God if I have a defect in my sight. I have to admit that I wear reading glasses. Does my vision have to be 20/20, or is there some wiggle room here?

f) I know from Lev 11:6-8 that touching the skin of a dead pig makes me unclean, but may I still play football if I wear gloves?

g) When I burn a bull on the altar as a sacrifice, I know it creates a pleasing odor for the Lord (Lev 1:9). The problem is my neighbors. They claim the odor is not pleasing to them. Should I smite them? I know you have studied these things extensively, so I am confident you can help. Thank you again for reminding us that God's word is eternal and unchanging.

Added by Mike M. 2011.
The Old Testament says that we must not suffer a witch to live. (Exodus 22:18 )
End quote

[Jonathan]

Ayn Rand, the secularist...

Ayn Rand was no mere secularist.

She was an Objectivist who recognized an objective reality greater than herself.

Greg

Hahaha!

Apey, what do you imagine that "secularist" means?!!!

Just when I think that you can't possibly get any more moronically retarded than you are, you prove me wrong by becoming infinitely more moronically retarded than you were the day before.

J

[Brant Gaede]

He means secularist as in a secularist leftist--one who twists reality to fit his philosophy. An Objectivist then would be one who seeks knowledge of reality for right action. However, "secularist" is his swear word for his ad hominem attacks for he is and is not a religionist as it suits him. Finding rationality in Greg is like finding a deer in the forest. The deer is there. So is Greg, frequently shooting himself instead. Like the Terminator, he is continually rebuilt to carry on with his mission. "He will not stop! That's all he does!" What we deer do is run, run, run from Greg's fun, fun, fun.

--Brant

we always win by the end of the movie, but they keep making those damn sequels!

[moralist]

Peter writes:

Aids isn't caused by secularism.

I totally agree, Peter, and didn't say it was.

It's just a natural consequence of the secular value of perversion. Not all secularists engage in perversion even if they promote and advocate it for others.

Greg

[Peter]

Brant wrote: He means secularist as in a secularist leftist--one who twists reality to fit his philosophy. An Objectivist then would be one who seeks knowledge of reality for right action. However, "secularist" is his swear word for his ad hominem attacks for he is and is not a religionist as it suits him.
end quote

I don't like to be a person who piles on but unfortunately I agree with your assessment, though Greg usually writes like a decent sort - except when he condemns GOOD people for mystical reasons. I am listening to Trump say that Iran’s supreme leader prophesized that Israel will not exist in 25 years. Greg is as disgusting as that murderous Muslim, because he has no rational compass. He is coming from the same place as Iran’s leader.

Greg wrote: It's just a natural consequence of the secular value of perversion. Not all secularists engage in perversion even if they promote and advocate it for others.
end quote

Perversion is not a natural consequence of secular values. To allow others freedom of action as long as they do not infringe on the rights of others is not advocating perversion. Perversion is a natural consequence of mysticism, and Greg, you are a perverted, slandering criminal.

Robert Tracinski wrote:
Moral law, in General Secularism and Ayn Rand's philosophy, is natural law: it is the logical, long-term consequences of one's ideas and actions on one's well-being and survival. The moral law is not someone's arbitrary invention. It is not a code imposed from above by some supernatural being, who is personally in charge of meting out rewards and punishment according to his preferences. Instead, moral law is as inevitable as the laws of physics. It is the law of cause and effect applied to human action.
end quote

Science is our best attempt to identify and explain cause and effect, and the scientific study of humans is an attempt to identify cause and effect as it applies to human actions. The person who uses their reason (as does a Scientist) is not seeking to impose artificial restrictions or limitations upon humans. However, he tries to ascertain what is probable if not inevitable. Morality is an attempt to identify the correct course of action and it is not an attempt to pigeon hole, or limit the aspirations of any human based on mysticism. To ignore the truths we discover is an attempt to evade reality.

What is, is. Science is not a moral issue, however, whether we use science or not, whether we think or not, is a moral issue. So to claim your made up bull shit is divine inspiration and if a person does not BELIEVE and behave as you prescribe then they are an immoral abomination. Basing morality on made up crap is stupid. It is an unearned slur upon decent people. You are the immoral person.

Semper cogitans fidele,
Peter Taylor

[Selene]

Point of information:

Ayn claimed that the US Constitution was a real example of what a proper government should be.

The drafters of the original document were mainly composed of deists.

Therefore, your comparison of Greg/Judeo Christian ethics and Islam/non Judeo Christian ethics fails.

A...

[Brant Gaede]

All the deists I ever heard about were essentially Christian cultural stock. God but no Trinity. Jesus as an historical figure only? God got it all going then went on to other things. I guess no God at all was too much of an alienating stretch to the society in which they were politically active--if not themselves. Jefferson as President went to church as a symbolic obligation to his office and supporters. That's my understanding; I may be wrong why and how much. So in the Declaration of Independence we get both "endowed by their Creator" and "the pursuit of happiness" referencing human rights. Pure Americana.

--Brant

not found on foreign shores much less from them--unless, maybe, Merry ole England and dancing around the Maypole as one expression, albeit greatly frowned upon by the Puritans pursuing salvation (?--I don't know all that much about this)

selfish is as selfish does (?!?!)

[Peter]

Adam wrote: Therefore, your comparison of Greg/Judeo Christian ethics and Islam/non Judeo Christian ethics fails.
end quote

Brant answered: Jefferson as President went to church as a symbolic obligation to his office and supporters.
end quote

I disagree with Adam and agree with Brant. Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, pantheism, Taoism, etc., are *inspired* by non rational proofs. And that illustrates how mystical beliefs conflict yet cannot be proven by any direct observation, history, or logic. They are all wrong. And that is why they kill each other.

Adam wrote: Ayn claimed that the US Constitution was a real example of what a proper government should be. The drafters of the original document were mainly composed of deists.
end quote

From the site, Difference Between: The theory says that God created the universe but then stopped playing an active role in controlling the universes as it left it in the hands of natural laws that he created along with our planet. God does not show up and can only be felt through these natural laws. This means that God does not intervene in the affairs of the world, and no super natural events or miracles can be ascribed to God.
end quote

The philosophical movement of Deism was an attempt to not have your head cut off by totalitarian religionists while espousing reason.

George H. Smith wrote: (1) Since Jefferson did not believe that rights are "self-evident" in the sense of being moral axioms that are incapable of rational justification, it is reasonable to suppose that he was merely establishing common theoretical ground early on in the Declaration. I think this is the significance of the wording, "WE HOLD these truths to be self-evident...." In other words, the doctrine of natural rights was the common ground on which most Americans (including those who opposed independence) stood, so he would make no attempt to justify it. We might call this a contextual axiom. Although not self-evident per se, the doctrine of inalienable rights was not in question, but was the fundamental principle that must ultimately decide the controversy over
American independence.

(2) Jefferson, like many of his contemporaries, was a deist. The god of deism, having created the universe, did not interfere thereafter, but left it alone to operate according to natural laws, including the moral laws that derive from human nature. (Indeed, deists would often use "god" as a synonym for "nature.") The important point here is that when deists attributed rights (or anything else) to god, this did not imply that rights could not be justified by reason. Quite the contrary – the deists viewed reason as the indispensable mechanism for discerning the "natural revelation" of physical and moral laws, in contradistinction to the "special revelation" of scripture, miracles, prophecy, and the like (which they rejected).

I discuss this in some detail in "Deism and the Assault on Revealed Religion," in *Atheism, Ayn Rand, and Other Heresies,* pp. 131-64. In other words, I think we need to cut Jefferson some slack and take into account the intellectual context in which the Declaration was written. 8-)
end quote

[Peter]

From the preamble: . . . We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these rights are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. . . .
end quote

A proof for the Rights of Men was given in several pages by Ayn Rand but the elegance of the deist Founding Fathers was in elevating, “endowed by their Creator” to axiom status. You can’t argue with that, in the same fashion that Greg elevates his hokey thinking to the one true self evident document, like in the Monty Python sketch, The Knights Who Say Neep! Though I don’t think the Founders were being neepish, just trying to save a lot of time. Greg in contrast is trying to proselytize and it isn't working.

[Wolf DeVoon]

Ayn claimed that the US Constitution was a real example of what a proper government should be.

The drafters of the original document were mainly composed of deists.

Let's think about this. State constitutions and the Articles of Confederation predated the US Constitution, so it wasn't America's first national scheme of government. There was nothing particularly "improper" about the Articles of Confederation or the several states whose constitutions provided free and fair elections, religious and civil liberty, common law courts, etc. The impetus to revise the Article of Confederation arose from (1) inability to compel the States to pay agreed requisitions; (2) unresolved disputes regarding state boundaries; (3) worthless Continental money, (4) unpaid war debts; (4) division of opinion regarding foreign trade; and (5) import and export state taxes levied on neighboring states. The 1786 Annapolis Convention called by Madison and Hamilton to discuss revision of the Articles of Confederation was poorly attended, so they called for another meeting in Philadelphia in 1787.

What happened in Philadelphia, which came to be known as the "Federal Convention"? New York walked out in disgust. Hamilton argued for a king. Small States threatened to walk out unless they remained on an equal footing with Large States. Slave States threatened to walk out unless they were constitutionally entitled to keep their slaves. No one was satisfied with the final draft of a US Constitution. A third of all delegates refused to sign it. Madison argued against a Bill of Rights, because it contradicted the idea of enumerated Federal powers.

Ratification was never assured and remained in doubt for years. It was not ratified by We The People.

Every Fourth of July, my fellow countrymen celebrate the mistaken notion that the United States was conceived in liberty. This reveals how little our constitutional history is studied. The U.S. Constitution was not conceived at all — it was a bastard product of compromise and contentious debate, winning ratification by a slim margin among the 20 percent of colonial population who were eligible to vote for assemblies of state politicians who narrowly approved it: Pennsylvania 46-23, Virginia 89-79, New York 30-27. [COGIGG, p.122]

What Rand thought proper is explained best by Thomas Paine in "The Rights of Man" --

A Constitution is a Thing antecedent to Government, and a Government is only the Creature of a Constitution. The Constitution of a Country is not the act of its Government, but of the People constituting a Government.

Whether the US Constitution was a thing created by the People is a debatable proposition. At best it was a compromise, based on pledges and promises that were never kept, which degenerated into a bankrupt leviathan of unchallengeable, unlimited power over states, localities, and individual citizens.

[Brant Gaede]

The President under the Constitution was always the elected king. Hamilton got the substance and let go the semantical. Washington was "The Father of the Country" because he led the army during The Revolutionary War, not because of his presidency. "The Father of the Constitution," according to the title of my grandfather's third Madison volume, was James Madison. The real Father of the Country we live in today was probably Alexander Hamilton and his financial wizardy and his influence on the convention taken together. But there is, of course, the reason why we refer to "The Founding Fathers"--the necessary aggregated influence.

--Brant

[Selene]

Ayn claimed that the US Constitution was a real example of what a proper government should be.

The drafters of the original document were mainly composed of deists.

Let's think about this. State constitutions and the Articles of Confederation predated the US Constitution, so it wasn't America's first national scheme of government. There was nothing particularly "improper" about the Articles of Confederation or the several states whose constitutions provided free and fair elections, religious and civil liberty, common law courts, etc. The impetus to revise the Article of Confederation arose from (1) inability to compel the States to pay agreed requisitions; (2) unresolved disputes regarding state boundaries; (3) worthless Continental money, (4) unpaid war debts; (4) division of opinion regarding foreign trade; and (5) import and export state taxes levied on neighboring states. The 1786 Annapolis Convention called by Madison and Hamilton to discuss revision of the Articles of Confederation was poorly attended, so they called for another meeting in Philadelphia in 1787.

What happened in Philadelphia, which came to be known as the "Federal Convention"? New York walked out in disgust. Hamilton argued for a king. Small States threatened to walk out unless they remained on an equal footing with Large States. Slave States threatened to walk out unless they were constitutionally entitled to keep their slaves. No one was satisfied with the final draft of a US Constitution. A third of all delegates refused to sign it. Madison argued against a Bill of Rights, because it contradicted the idea of enumerated Federal powers.

Ratification was never assured and remained in doubt for years. It was not ratified by We The People.

Every Fourth of July, my fellow countrymen celebrate the mistaken notion that the United States was conceived in liberty. This reveals how little our constitutional history is studied. The U.S. Constitution was not conceived at all — it was a bastard product of compromise and contentious debate, winning ratification by a slim margin among the 20 percent of colonial population who were eligible to vote for assemblies of state politicians who narrowly approved it: Pennsylvania 46-23, Virginia 89-79, New York 30-27. [COGIGG, p.122]

What Rand thought proper is explained best by Thomas Paine in "The Rights of Man" --

A Constitution is a Thing antecedent to Government, and a Government is only the Creature of a Constitution. The Constitution of a Country is not the act of its Government, but of the People constituting a Government.

Whether the US Constitution was a thing created by the People is a debatable proposition. At best it was a compromise, based on pledges and promises that were never kept, which degenerated into a bankrupt leviathan of unchallengeable, unlimited power over states, localities, and individual citizens.

I substantially agree with your analysis.

Essentially, the structure of the government that was created by the Federal Convention in Philadelphia was as contentious as childbirth.

Charles McIlwain, author of Constitutionalism: Ancient and Modern is a powerful overview of this line of thought:

In 1792 Arthur Young mentions with contempt the French notion of a constitution, which, he says, “is a new term they have adopted; and which they use as if a constitution was a pudding to be made by a receipt.”1 To Thomas Paine, writing at the same time, the recent American written constitutions are “to liberty, what a grammar is to language.” In another place, speaking of constitutions in general, he says: [2] “A constitution is not the act of a government, but of a people constituting a government, and a government without a constitution is power without right.” “A constitution is a thing antecedent to a government; and a government is only the creature of a constitution.” It seems probable that Paine means by “constitution” nothing less than the written constitutions of America or France. For, he says, “the continual use of the word ‘constitution’ in the English parliament shows there is none; and that the whole is merely a form of government without a constitution, and constituting itself with what power it pleases.” “The act by which the English parliament empowered itself to sit for seven years, shews there is no constitution in England. It might, by the same authority have sate any greater number of years, or for life.”2

Great book by the way...http://oll.libertyfund.org/titles/2145

[moralist]

Peter writes:

Perversion is not a natural consequence of secular values.

Of course it is, Peter.

The three pillars of the secular political religion of leftism are dope, perversion and abortion.

For secularists, this Holy Trinity is untouchable.

Greg

[moralist]

"Whether the US Constitution was a thing created by the People is a debatable proposition. At best it was a compromise, based on pledges and promises that were never kept, which degenerated into a bankrupt leviathan of unchallengeable, unlimited power over states, localities, and individual citizens."

I can add the other side of that equation...

The government's degeneration perfectly matches the personal degeneration of the people.

People who fail to govern themselves...

will neither deserve a decent government,

nor will they ever have a decent government.

Greg