What Would The Founding Fathers Say

[No Censorship]

"If we would've known this, we would've stayed with the king." They and future generations fought and died to protect and preserve our Constitution. This generation idly watches as it's torn to shreds, one small piece at a time. We're squandering an unprecedented legacy of liberty with our apathy.

[Corp]

"Sweet you took all the land from the Indians and replaced them with good white Christians. High five!"

[No Censorship]

"Sweet you took all the land from the Indians and replaced them with good white Christians. High five!"

That was after the good Red pagans took the land from other good Red pagans. Can I get an "amen"?

[aquatus1]

"If we would've known this, we would've stayed with the king." They and future generations fought and died to protect and preserve our Constitution. This generation idly watches as it's torn to shreds, one small piece at a time. We're squandering an unprecedented legacy of liberty with our apathy.

What part of the Constitution has been removed that you want put back in?

[Gromdor]

I know some teetotalers that think we should have never gotten rid of the 18th amendment. They also think we should be more stringent on the war on drugs. (Death penalty)

I think that personal feelings due to the actions of alcoholic loved ones shape their opinion more than logic, however.

[scorpiosonic]

They would be appalled at our overbearing, overreaching, oppressive federal government. They would be upset that we, the people, allowed this to happen. They would probably tell us we needed another revolution.

As to the 2nd amendment they would be proud that they provided the means for us to overthrow our oppressive government.

As to the 1st, they would be proud of that one too, although I think they would have a problem with so called "hate" speech being against the law. No changes necessary.

The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.

Thomas Jefferson

I agree, but changes are necessary, and should be made to the Constitution.

They would be very disappointed w/ the way the Constitution is being MISITERPRETED, (too many examples to list here) the Executive Branch's abuse of its powers, (inc. its war-mongering), the conduct of our do-nothing Congress and ALL 3 Branches' failure to serve the ppl's best interests, (while serving their own), the nearly complete lack of concern/action re our unsecured S. Border and homeland security, etc.

Not to mention the way they have mishandled our Illegal Immigration crisis, its associated selective law enforcement, and their pandering to Illegal Immigrants @ the expense of LEGAL US Citizens, inc. the appalling state of our Criminal Justice System.

Edited July 13, 2014 by scorpiosonic

[Uncle Sam]

I founding fathers would be ashamed of us because we are giving up our rights to the government left and right for this so called protection.

[Drayno]

Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, John Adams, Alexander Hamilton, George Mason, Benjamin Franklin - I even daresay Abraham Lincoln, the man who invaded the South - would be disgusted by the gross overreach from our government. And calling it a gross overreach, by the way, is far more generous than those fraudulent anti-federalists deserve.

[Babe Ruth]

I founding fathers would be ashamed of us because we are giving up our rights to the government left and right for this so called protection.

The 'protection' is an illusion, sold by .gov to a willing audience and gullible.

The chance of actually being impacted by an act of "terrorism" is about the same as being struck by lightning. But, we are taught to embrace our inner cowards, and imagine a terrorist behind every tree.

A hoax of epic proportions.

[aquatus1]

So, to basically sum up the last few posts:

"Don't really care what the Founding Fathers would think, but here's my personal opinion on the political state of the U.S., and I'm going to go ahead and assume they would agree with me."

Edited July 13, 2014 by aquatus1

[scorpiosonic]

What else can we do but assume what they would think?

[F3SS]

That was my question too. What would you expect?

[aquatus1]

The founding fathers of the United States of America were very smart, educated, people. They wrote a lot of their opinions down. Particularly in situations where the major world powers on the planet at the time where concerned, particularly when they were laying out the rules for an entire new country.

It is not at all difficult to find out precisely what our founding fathers would think. We aren't talking about people living in ancient times writing in a now-dead language. Remember that these guys were chosen by their people because they were the best at communicating their ideas. They built their careers by being popular and intelligent in an era where popularity and intelligence was still very much a survival trait. They communicated their ideas successfully by means of writing, and their writings are, and have always been, publicly available.

It is mind-boggling to me that it doesn't even occur to you, with the incredible technological invention that is the internet literally at your fingertips, that you have the ability, in just a few short hours, to read the words of some of the most influential and significant people in the history of the country. People are talking about illusions of freedom, about squandering our liberty, about how much we lost, and all the while, they surrounded themselves with illusions of knowledge, they squander the freedom to learn history, they complain about losing the ability to question without noticing that they themselves have lost the ability to question.

The founding fathers would not be shocked at a strong federal government over-ruling state government. They themselves decided precisely to do just that. The founding fathers literally abolished the U.S. government that minimized federal powers and emphasized state powers, because they saw that it wasn't working. They were not sent to the Constitutional Convention to do this; their sole purpose was meant to try and fix some of the problems between states. Instead, they chose to throw everything out the window and start new from scratch. In today's language, we refer to this as a coup d'etat. They literally overthrew the government and installed a new one, one with stronger central powers, because they saw that the previous, less restrictive, government was destroying the country and simply did not have the capacity to grow. It is an inevitable product of social evolution; unless separate groups join together as a single group, they inevitably fall apart and begin to fight against each other. It is a lesson we have seen in history time and time again, and these educated men knew that, saw that happening to our country, and took steps to prevent it.

A lot of guys here don't know what a "card catalog" is. Back in the day, we had to go to libraries, spend hours looking up books on tiny little faded yellow cards, that only had the briefest summary of what the entire book was about. We then had to go to the stacks, find the book (usually, books, because it was time consuming and not worthwhile to search for less than 3 or 4 at a time), search the book in the hopes of finding relevant information, then copy the information either by hand, or asking the librarian to photocopy it for you (my upperclassmen were accustomed to writing it down in their journals). And, if you found nothing, well, the day was nearly over and you would just have to come back and try again the next day.

There was no "cherry-picking". By the time you put in that much labor into getting your data, you damn well were going to read and understand that data, because if you didn't and you misrepresented it, not only would you be wrong, you would be an idiot for wasting all that time and effort.

Nowadays, data is cheap and plentiful, and perhaps that is part of the problem. It's like "found" money. You didn't earn it, so you don't respect it. You just toss it around, and if it wasted, oh well, plenty more where that came from. You end up acting like a teenager with a fist full of 20s from daddums trying to impress others with "your" wealth. You take no responsibility for what you say.

If you want to complain about the government, fine, there's plenty to complain about, heck, most of the founding fathers made the complaints at the time that people are making today (which should really tell you something about the nature of complaints). But don't complain out of boredom. Don't complain out of apathy. Know what you are complaining about. Read about it. Both sides. Who agrees with you (I bet you will find some interesting names)? Who doesn't (bet you'll be surprised how often the same names appear)? Don't be a conspiracy "hipster".

Edited July 13, 2014 by aquatus1

[scorpiosonic]

I agree w/ what you are saying here for the most part, A1.

BUT we have no way of knowing for sure how they would react to the current status quo. The Constitution hasn't changed much since then, but alot of other things have. From their perspective, they would be entering a whole new world, and there are too many (un)known variables in the human psyche, (both in theirs and ours) for us to accurately predict what even one of them would say/feel, etc.

I'm thinking Ben Franklin, who completely reorganized the Postal Service for the better, would be disappointed if he saw it operate today is a good assumption, but that's all it is.

How can you possibly know what did/didn't occur to us, or what we've read/not read???

"....It is mind-boggling to me that it doesn't even occur to you, with the incredible technological invention that is the internet literally at your fingertips, that you have the ability, in just a few short hours, to read the words of some of the most influential and significant people in the history of the country...."

Edited July 13, 2014 by scorpiosonic

[F3SS]

Was all that directed at me? I hope not because when I brought up the founders thoughts on page 3 you mocked it. Now you rant about the wonders of the Internet as if I'm pulling things out of my **#.

[No Censorship]

What part of the Constitution has been removed that you want put back in?

We can start with the Fourth Amendment. That's been under the most attack from the statists.

[aquatus1]

Was all that directed at me?

No. Note the alternating use of "you" and "people", indicating that "you" is being used as a general term, as well as multiple examples taken from multiple posts.

I hope not because when I brought up the founders thoughts on page 3 you mocked it.

No, I did not. Go ahead, read it again. Try and find a mock. Correcting isn't mocking.

Now you rant about the wonders of the Internet as if I'm pulling things out of my **#.

No, I generally I rant about ignorance, which includes but is not limited to people pulling things out of their ass. The evolution of this is going to the internet, pulling stuff out of other people's asses, and calling it research. Neither, however, is research; at best, it can be considered crowdsourcing opinions. Actual research, the kind that actually turns into knowledge and makes one stronger by virtue of having done the work yourself, involves going to the original source and determining your own conclusions, conclusions that can be sourced from the original material.

In this particular case, I am ranting about how it has gotten to the point that it doesn't even occur to people that it is indeed possible to research such things as the opinions of the founding fathers, as if it was a mystery lost to time.

[aquatus1]

We can start with the Fourth Amendment.

All right, sounds good. You are saying you want it put back to how it was originally? Like, a reset, so to speak?

That's been under the most attack from the statists.

...

As opposed to what? Anarchists?

[+OverSword]

They weren't expecting the kind of armament currently being used now, were they? Not exactly squirrel rifles, huh? Not exactly being used for the same reasons everybody had firearms back then, to feed their families and rid the farm of varmints, are they? I saw photos of those guys drawing down on federal agents on that ranch in Nevada, don't think they founding fathers would be crazy about that, either. And militias are supposed to protect us, not draw down on the government or their fellow citizens, are they not? Context is everything. Back then a lot of these gun-toting, self-styled "patriots" wouldn't even be allowed to vote because unless they were property owners.

They no doubt would have assumed that we would need what we have now to counter what is available to be used against us. It's exactly as it was for them then so this is a very lame argument . The founding fathers would have applauded citizens standing up to the corrupt politics affecting the Bundy Ranch incident as well. A bit of digging reveals that Harry Ried had huge amounts of money invested in other nearby land and were he able to also scoop up that bit he was in a position to make huge profits. Be real.

[Thanato]

Why is this in this news section?

[F3SS]

No, I did not. Go ahead, read it again. Try and find a mock. Correcting isn't mocking.

You certainly dismissed it at the least and I don't believe it was in need of correction.

In this particular case, I am ranting about how it has gotten to the point that it doesn't even occur to people that it is indeed possible to research such things as the opinions of the founding fathers, as if it was a mystery lost to time.

There's plenty of us who have done plenty of reading and research on the founders, their views and their intents. It's brought up constantly on these forums and remains a mystery to only a few amongst the regular crowd on these political threads.

Other than that, this particular thread is premised on speculation so it's to be expected in larger quantities for this discussion.

Edited July 14, 2014 by F3SS

[Collateral Damage]

Some would rather stay dead than live in the America we know today — that's just my opinion, though.

[aquatus1]

You certainly dismissed it at the least

Then you acknowledge you were not being mocked? That the use of the word "mock", as scornful or derisive, did not describe my response?

and I don't believe it was in need of correction.

So you said. But that is all you said. You neither supported your original statement, nor did you support your disagreement.

I didn't simply claim it was incorrect (or claim it was incorrect at all), but rather I posted the exact definition as used by the founding fathers. Why was this significant?

Because the definition made it very clear that the people being defined by the 2nd amendment were specifically people who could serve in a militia. Whether or not service was voluntary or compulsory was not clear, but it is very clear that if you were between 18 and 45, and you were part of the militia, you had the right (in fact, one of the articles that was not ratified in the Bill of Rights even made it mandatory) to bear arms. This is how the Constitution was written and presented by our founding fathers at the birth of our new nation back in Dec 15, 1791, 221 years ago.

Whereas you talked about the Supreme Court deciding that bearing arms is an individual right, not a militia right, something they did not do until 2008, 6 years ago. Incidentally, they also said there were limits and there was nothing prohibiting regulation.

There's plenty of us who have done plenty of reading and research on the founders, their views and their intents. It's brought up constantly on these forums and remains a mystery to only a few amongst the regular crowd on these political threads.

I beg to disagree.

I say there are plenty who have convinced themselves they have done plenty of reading and research. They think this because they are happy with the conclusion they have arrived at. They have spent a lot of time finding the "yes" answers, and virtually none looking for the "no" answers. They consider all data equal, be it cherry-picked or contextual. They accept general knowledge as detailed knowledge. They believe that they have searched as much as they can search, and it catches them completely off guard that there might actually be a way to learn even more.

That, more than anything else, is the main point of my rant. All data, knowledge, research, is not equal. The ability to think critically is not instinctive or a default. It is a skill, a behavior, it must be exercised to be strong, and it is very obvious when it is not. Believe it or not, it is most definitely possible for a skilled researcher to know when someone has not done their research, the exact same way it is possible for a skilled tennis player to recognize a duffer before they even step up to the field.

Other than that, this particular thread is premised on speculation so it's to be expected in larger quantities for this discussion.

Which is basically what I was commenting on with my post at the top of the page. As you say, this isn't a formal academic debate, which is why I am able to get away with ranting. But still...for people to allow their intellectual habits to descend to the state where incredulity that someone could possess know something they themselves consider unknowable as a default defense...

That is the effect of "found" knowledge.

[F3SS]

Not just a militia. And I'm not arguing for an unlimited right. That's all I have time for. Goodnight.

[Yamato]

...

As opposed to what? Anarchists?

Not opposed to anarchists, of course not. Anarchists aren't against rights as a group, but tyranny (the force of the state, ergo "statist") is the polar opposite of liberty.