Originally Posted by antarius
Let's just say, for sake of making this a little easier to speak on -- the entire Patriot Act was deemed unconstitutional by the Supreme Court and tossed out the window, okay?
Would I be against all of the authors being punished? No. It's our representatives job to read the bills and not pass unconstitutional material.
People try, all the time, to abolish our civil rights. Right wingers, left wingers, communists, socialists, terrorists, columbians, cubans, mexicans, canadians, the ACLU, whites, blacks, etc. etc. etc., every single group has people in it that do things against our constitution or attempt to pass laws that disobey it -- it's the job of our representatives to ensure they don't pass.
To put it simply, I'd demand and expect the rest of the country would demand that we not re-elect any official that voted to allow the unconstitutional document into power -- assuming he should have reasonably known it was unconstitutional.
I say that last line because you know, there could have been an item or two that was based on previous case-law, and by that standard it may have been legal and constitutional -- if the case-law since changed then I wouldn't expect the representative who voted to allow that responsible, for that SINGLE item.
Bottom line, people are allowed to attempt to make illegal and unconstitutional laws -- it's our representatives job to ensure they don't come into power. If they do, then they did not do their job satisfactorly and should be removed. Put in jail? Depends, but in this instance -- likely not, removed from power? You damn right.
OK now we are getting somewhere because for as much as you may think I am far left and as much as I think you are far right we agree on this point.
Problem is though that the people have been trained to stop looking at the issues and instead move to party line politics. They will vote for a rep or a pres simply because he or she is of the same party but leave the political stance on issues completely by the wayside.
Personally I could give a shit less which party a person belongs to and instead would rather have a moderate from either party making the decisions. I would like corporate interests completely removed from politics. I would like religious interests completely removed from politics.
My earlier comment about Bush was a stab at him as I find him to be a dangerous man of power with many of the things he has done and tried to do. I know he is "supposed" to protect the country from harm and invasion and promote the countries products to others, but from what I have seen him do in all honesty has not been necessarily fr the best interest of the country but rather for his paycheck supporters.
It's ok that we disagree on this matter but I think his entie\re cabinet has been pretty shady in more than a few areas and it has had a negative impact on the US, it's allies, and in general has done more damage than good in many areas.
Yes the war on terrorism needed to be fought and I have said this many times, but I have also said many times over that the invasion of Iraq had nothing to do with terrorism and was more of a vendetta. This is ifor all intense purposes a treasonous act because it puts my friends and yours as well who took an oath to protect the US and its society unecessarily into harms way, which is something he took oath not to do.
Now I am going to catch hell for stating what I have and that is fine I expect it, but try to look at it from as close to legal description and see what I am trying to point out.
The longer the voting population sits idly by and lets these things happen the more we move towards a totalitarian state...and once it happens it will be nearly impossible to reverse it and its concequences.