ParanoiA

Ha! You just changed the business model! It's right there in the very text you pasted. Please stop moving the goal posts. I have consistently denied your claim that vocabulary alone excuses one from this civil rights legislation. I have consistently stated that it is entirely dependent on your business model, as defined by the legislation. And the ACLU agrees, emphatically. Thanks for the link. As I've stated over and over again, you cannot open a restaurant and just call it a "private club" and start discriminating. You must change your business model so it really operates like a club. A club doesn't operate like a "public" establishment. Clubs depend on a membership arrangement that must be qualified - they can't dream up any ole method to establish members. In addition, in an earlier post you tried to make believe I could do this specifically to get around these laws. And again, your very own source contradicts this in the part you pasted in: You must operate that restaurant differently than "public" restaurants. Merely assigning different vocabulary doesn't do it. And, we're back to denying the right to use one's own property as they wish.

Is that on Penn & Teller's 'Bullshit'? If so, I don't know how I missed it, but I've got to see it.

Wow. You're way, way wrong. Please read the civil rights act of 1964. I cannot believe you're still pretending as if by calling your business a "private club" - without respect to the business model - excuses you from this Civil Rights act. Let's re-read section (b) together, shall we? You cannot open a restaurant and call it a private club and then discriminate. Come on, one doesn't even really have to go to the trouble that I did to prove this out to you - simple logic reveals the utter futility and comedic value of assuming a person can just call his hardware store or motel a "private club" and suddenly get to discriminate. Your business model dictates whether it's public or private - not your vocabulary.

That traffic goes through their equipment. They have every right to control it. The phone company doesn't allow you to hook up any goofy device you want to your phone line and expect it to work either. You must meet their standards before you can use their equipment that way. Since voice traffic is physically isolated from the signaling and carrier layers they have no fear of harming their network with any creepy calls you want to make. But there is no such isolation with pure digital. Their servers could crash and burn if you accessed the right virus. No such harmless expectation exists in this business. So no, I don't get it. That's an invalid analogy since I never agreed it was ok to destroy your transmission or your intellectual property. They should be able to restrict it, however. The proper analogy would be a parcel service that won't deliver my package at all, for some silly reason they dream up. Yes, I would be pissed. But I have no right to send the government after them to make them carry my package - which could contain a bomb, poison, illicit substances..etc. They have every right to examine my package, and reject it. It's their facilities at risk here.

No, lack of funds doesn't excuse protecting the citizenry. That's the first job of any legitimate government. However, I'm not impressed with fences, and other wasteful engineering methods. I'm more impressed with technological solutions. Why don't we hear more about them? Have I been watching too much sci-fi? (it's entirely possible...I mean, the Others were able to keep the smoke monster at bay with technology...)

That's true, but I don't see much in the way of other options. You can't just let people poison the air because you put up a sign that says so. Somehow, it must be isolated, such that workers and customers are entering a "dangerous" environment by their own will. I don't know, somehow I still feel like I'm contradicting myself. But it's hard to concede to poison release.

That's exactly what I said in post #22. It wasn't meant to be so much a great analogy as much as it was supposed to be a reminder that your enthusiasm for dictating the use of other's property is contingent upon your agreement with those specific policies. Once another group forces something intolerant to your beliefs, I suspect a renewed interest in personal property rights. Same here. Someone here at SFN made a great point one time comparing smoke to mustard gas. It really made me think. An isolated ventilation system or outdoor smoking area really is the only solution in my mind. I don't think you can just release toxins in the air and expect everyone to accept the damage - I don't care how minute that damage is estimated to be. There are two issues here. One, you clearly don't understand the Civil Rights legislation you're arguing about as you have restated you believe we can just call something a "private club" and suddenly we can do what we want. That's not true. I provided the criteria, and you just honed in on "public" and thought you found gold. Two, the way the Civil Rights legislation is actually written, certain types of businesses are considered public by the kind of business they conduct. This is largely because of the source of authority for these laws, which rests on interstate commerce. See Heart of Atlanta Motel v. United States. Title II is the public accommodation provision. While the challenge was based on the Commerce Clause (and 5th and 13th amendments), the decision supports the method of how public is defined. Heart of Atlanta Motel would hardly fight in court if they merely needed to call their motel a "private club". And this is what I mean by smoke and mirrors and make believe bullshit. I'm not trying disparage any particular person's position with that statement, I'm attacking these rationalizations about people suddenly becoming non-people once they trade stuff in a building. The mental gymnastics required to believe this is astonishing to me. And further, that others would actually argue a difference between a business being public and private by the owner merely embracing certain vocabulary - with identical business models. Who seriously believes that makes sense, even if it were true? I don't see this exchange evolving into anything productive unless you're ready to discuss the assumptions that lead to business entities not being people anymore, that have a right to use their property as they wish. Just like your house.

Same here. I can't reconcile "Border enforcement is a part of realistic, commonsense reform.." with "Obama administration's militarization of the border amounts to a submission to the political forces brought by the Republican Party". Ok, Menendez, is it "part of realistic, commonsense reform" or not? Or is he just pissed because republicans wanted it more? I suppose I should be happy for the step forward, but I'm just not. It's lame. Maybe helping to spot border transgressions is more significant than I want to believe, but it sure sounds like more symbolism. We need armed bad asses along the border that participate in apprehension and preventing entry illegally.

Right, it's an invalid assumption. Once you make the leap, it's easy to fall the rest of the way down.

Hey, if all you propose is that I call my business a "private club" and suddenly I can enjoy my property as I wish, then great. My next question would be....what exactly is the point in this vocabulary exercise? What do you think you're accomplishing with it? Don't bother. Because that's not how it works. http://www.citizensource.com/History/20thCen/CRA1964/CRA2.htm I cannot just open any business I like and call it a private club. I'm forced to use my property a certain way, just to satisfy the populist moral code. I share this moral code and it won't affect me personally, but that's merely incidental and a liberty offense. Second of all, I'm not crazy about licensing and how it's abused. That's exactly the kind of bureaucratic crap big business loves to see - keep the little competitors to a minimum using government. All that said, this is a matter of principle that doesn't even make the list of priorities. I don't know a single libertarian, even Rand, that gives a crap about repealing any piece of the civil rights acts. The offense is minimal. There are a ton of other laws that go way further in abridging our liberties than that. And just as much so, the notion that we'd embrace racism all over again and self segregate is to have been raised in a closet for the past 40 years.

This is true. While Obama was involved, it was inherited I think 2 years after inception and clearly doesn't fit with my point at all. I'll happily take that back.

Well sure, the civil rights act of 1965 does just that. Although, my point was along the lines of forcing someone to use their property in a way that supporters of such ideas might find unnattractive. It always seems to "make sense" to ban smoking on someone else's property, or force integration in a private business - the essential mainstream position. But, if suddenly smokers lobbied and used the same presumptions of power to control other's property, or per a SCOTUS ruling and they were successful, the mainstream wouldn't like it too much. Imagine the pegoratives aimed at non-smokers for bitching about having to be tolerant of smokers - to be forced to integrate in their favorite restaurant. Suddenly the notion of private property would receive a renewed appreciation. In my opinion, of course. In fact, the single best way to achieve such renewed appreciation is to demand our strip clubs to comply to the EOE standard - include men and ugly people, anyone who applies and can dance in the buff. Suddenly, men everywhere would become Rand and Ron Paul supporters...

It never stopped the administration before, I don't see how this possible socialist perception would suddenly pause them now. I'm quite sure that iNow is right, there would most certainly be that kind of backlash - although it would pale in comparison to TARP, the takeover of GM and the Healthcare Bill. It's a disaster, not a variable speed financial crisis. And if that's true, then I would challenge his leadership. To allow public perception to affect one to the point they fail to do their job is to follow, not to lead. But I don't think any of that is true. I think Obama has taken a position: that BP ought to clean up their mess and hold them accountable for it. That may conflict with Obama's implied charge to come to the aid of the citizens affected by this spill, and the environmental cost, but that's the complex nature of things. I don't have any issues with how he's handling it, actually. And while I haven't been following this as much lately, I trust he's still holding firm that BP accept their responsibility. And to BP's credit, what little I've read seems to suggest they're busting their ass to fix it. My objection still lies in the nature of offshore drilling - or as Pangloss critiqued, perhaps deep water drilling. So far, this seems like a situation where people are doing what they're supposed to be doing, we're just unhappy with the results since it's more complicated than we'd like.

Think about what you just wrote. You're entirely right about "evolutionary success experienced by tight well-coordinated and symbiotic troops of organisms" - government is merely a tool to that end. That tool is only needed as long as we can't achieve that end without it. Note that we change tools too, as we evolve. Tools are only needed because of limitations of the human form. I wouldn't need a wrench if I could tighten a bolt by hand. They are responses to limitations. We already have begun the process of thinking around our evolutionary impulses - such as in-group/ out-group dynamics and so forth. In time, it only stands to reason we won't need a centralized control system to force cooperation. Also, consider the generalist and the specialist. The specialists go extinct at far greater a rate than generalists. The cost is efficiency. Centralization of behaviors is specialization. It makes more sense to cultivate diversity of thought and behavior in order to maximize our ability to adapt to rapid changes in environment. Libertarianism serves the generalist society.

I apologize for the length, I'm not the most succint individual. I have a lot of passion, and it's difficult to stop my fingers from going and going and going.... Feel free to pay me back in kind, I promise to read every word. It's a statement about libertarian federalism. I'm almost offended, anymore, that we are required to fight about how we each want to live, forcing one or the other to accept a discomforting quality of life. I'd rather deal with the problems created by each of us moving our political objections to the state level. Allowing more variety among the states gives each of us the opportunity to live under the kind of government we prefer, rather than to be forced to reconcile our preferences into one standard. I would really like you to like libertarianism. But more importantly, I would really like you to be able to live under the kind of rules that make you happiest. Some people like blue, some like red. Why must we insist they accept purple as a compromise? Yes, I realize there are new problems generated by the 50 laboratories approach - but they are a better set of problems to contend with than out of control federalism that is ruining the quality of life for most and is responsible for an empire that has pissed off half the world. Now is the time for libertarianism more than before. We have evolved enough morally to enjoy a much better, and prouder result. Your countrymen will make you proud. No, the libertarian knife is for freeing the individual from the majority's whims. Libertariansim is about the individual - not really about success at all. You and I can define success differently. Maybe I see success as a musician working at Taco Bell, and I'm content with that. Maybe you need to be a millionaire to be successful - libertarianism is for both of us. Don't forget, libertarianism is a statement about law and governing. Libertarianism isn't a home for greedy rich people, it's a home for freedom loving individuals that abhore investing in government to change society. Government is a response to man's limitations in ethical cooperation. Just as fighting crime carries the ideal of a zero-crime rate, the libertarian philosophy carries the ideal of zero-government. You can't get zero government by growing the relationship between government and man. What are we saying if we invest in and grow a necessary evil?

I think it's a terrific question. Here's another one: What if the smokers had used government to force business owners to allow smoking? What if you had to deal with smokers in every restaraunt, by law? Most would think that to be insanely ridiculous, but it's the same presumption of forcing others to use their own property by some other group's notion of fairness. The non-smokers are just lucky that the safety issue of smoking trumps any liberty issue of tolerance.

Could you elaborate on this? Libertarian ideology actually just requires you to let go. Stop controlling everyone else's behavior. Stop pitting ideological classes of people against each other to force one, central, standardized output. You're free to be as you want to be so long as you don't hurt others and their property. You don't get to control them and they don't get to control you. Each gets to live your respective lives the way you want. And with 50 states, you can each have, essentially, the government you like. Without all the centralization, you can have the variety of state governments that can accomodate the various types of people here. At the end of the day, I want you and I to both be happy. I'm less inclined to convince you of living life under my kind of government, and more inclined for to enjoy the kind of government you want - just give me the same respect. That's libertarianism. I was listening to Walter Williams at lunch time, and he asked a question in a way I really appreciated, although I didn't get to hear his answer: If you have one group of people that want government in their lives, safety nets and etc and you have one group of people who want liberty, and the government out of their lives, should they be made to fight each other? What I hear in his question is more like...why do we require they fight and antagonize each other? Why is it so important to make one group submit to the other, or even both groups compromise at all - when they could each just have their way? Why are we so convinced every freaking issue that comes up needs to be fought and reconciled at the federal level with winners and losers. Too much federalism. Way too much federalism in our culture.

It's amazing what happens when you break through the thick layers of crap covering the mainstream's ideology, jryan. My advice is to continue thinking that through, and you will find excuse after excuse, exception after exception to their tired old arguments of legislating morality. Of course, then you see the conservatives doing it too... Actually, I thought you'd appreciate most of those since the bulk of them were used to disparage the convenient out created by distinguishing a different code of ethics for people engaging in trade from people engagin in anything else. Somehow "trading stuff" magically transports us to another reality? I don't think so. Apparently you do.

I disagree with this vehemently. I don't believe one should be picking ideologies as one's guide - ideology is a conclusion not the query. So, one should be clear about liberty and where they stand, and then after observation they would figure out that the libertarian philsophy seems to match what they believe to be right and wrong. So you're essentially asking libertarians to forget about the rigidity of right and wrong and join you and the majority in delusional exception thinking. That's weird, because that kind of expectation completely ignores and dismisses our insistence on consistency and honesty toward individual liberty. No, I don't think anyone should follow their ideology as a guide, and then just chuck the parts that are hard to argue in the modern context. That modern society is so utterly lost and pathetic is not a good reason to join them and sacrifice what we know, or at least believe, to be absolutely right.

Yeah, I think iNow, Bascule and Ecoli sum up my disappointments right nicely. I lost all respect for him when he bailed out of Meet The Press - that's the perfect place to lay your intellectual case and best chance at being received fairly. But he blew it. And now he's showing his cowardice as he pretends to apologize and take it back, while not actually taking it back...but not actually sticking to it either...I'm not sure what the hell he's saying at this point. Rand Paul. Grow a spine and take up for your beliefs. Or stop believing them.

I'm sorry, I should have been more inclusive in how I established the thread. Nothing you say would be dismissed at all and we do share so much legal structure. To your point, I completely agree. As Scalia put it, inferring "intent" or "original intent" misses the point of the limitations also built into that text. For instance, one could conclude that the "right to bear arms shall not be infringed" carried an intent to 'arm the citizenry' and therefore we must ensure citizens are armed - suggesting actively helping the citizens to arm themselves. But, of course, that ignores the qualitative text of "shall not be infringed", which limits the government to only staying out of the way, and that's quite a bit different. That's not a great example actually, but that's the gist of his point. Purpose and Intent do not naturally contain limitations - yet the text itself does contain limitation. And that limitation is part of the law they passed. They didn't pass "intentions", they passed "laws".

Yes. That is exactly the same can of worms as purpose and consequence. Original Meaning makes the least assumptions and draws on the least amount of subjectivity and personal bias to form conclusions about the text. Of course, none of the methods, including Strict Constructionism can claim pure fidelity to its authors.

This seems to be an objection based on appearances. I would like to ask everyone to remember how that argument was received when it was used to disparage "spending our way out of debt". Not to mention, many of us didn't agree with TARP anyway, so thanks for the opportunity to laugh at this mess.

In politics, we often complain about supreme court decisions and how they've expanded power or restricted progress, depending on which side you populate for a given issue. But there is a methodology employed by the justices that direct how they interpret the Constitution. Needless to say, the depth of jurisprudence creates a wealth of philosophical distinctions and derivatives. If anyone wants to argue or discuss at such depth, that's great and I'm all for it, but I'm thinking it more productive to boil this down to Judicial Conservatism and Judicial Liberalism. Judicial Conservatism is associated with the Textualist (rejecting non-textual sources), Originalist (closely related to Textualism, particularly Original Meaning) and Strict Constructionist (to construe the text strictly - often misapplied to Originalists, like Scalia). John Roberts, Samuel Alito, Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas are current Judicial Conservatives, mainly of the Originalist camp. Judicial Liberalism is associated with the Living Constitutionalist (that the document has dynamic meaning, to flex with evolving society). Derivatives include the Pragmatist (appeals to anachronistic shortcomings), and those focused on Intent (belief that the founders actually intended such flexibility). Stephen Breyer, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Sonia Sotomayor are current Living Constitutionalists. Elena Kagan has also claimed the Living Constitution method. Judicial Moderacy is a mix of the two above, usually labeled as the swing vote. Anthony Kennedy and Sandra Day O'Connor are such. Stephen Bryer has stated there are 6 tools used by justices: 1) The text itself 2) History of the statute or provision 3) The tradition that surrounds the words 4) Precedent *5) Purpose or Value encoded in the statute *6) Consequences of the ruling 5 and 6 are generally where the Living Constitutionalist and Originalist part ways. To the originalist, Purpose and Consequence are far too personal and subjective to weild without violating the separation of powers. They are instruments of legislative creation, which is supposed to be left to the Legislature and in part by the Executive. They appeal to the amendment process to update and evolve the document to match society's changing values and ethics. Obviously, I definitely fall into the category of Judicial Conservatism. Namely, the Original Meaning. Original Intent is far too precarious and essentially employes the same subjective tools as Purpose and Consequence. This is a relatively new discovery for me. In fact, I'm actually far more drawn to Strict Constructionism, however that only works if the document is written for strict interpretation - and as well all know, the Constitution is not written that way at all. So, what about you guys? Does your preferred intrepretation methodology essentially match your ideological position? I believe it is possible to be a judicial conservative while maintaining a strong liberal preference in law. And vice versa. Edit: Crap, I forgot to add the poll. Ah well...