dagblog - Comments for "How Democracies Work"

see below

Elusive Trope — Wed, 05 Dec 2012 13:28:26 +0000

see below

Ok, you favor the police

PeraclesPlease — Wed, 05 Dec 2012 05:58:25 +0000

In reply to I would never call America a

Ok, you favor the police state kind of voting democracy. Noted.

Ten commandments includes though shalt not kill, steal, infringe on IP (thy neighbor's wife & ass), marriage rights - primitive, but would have kept the guy at Gitmo alive.

Well, maybe considering the

Elusive Trope — Wed, 05 Dec 2012 04:53:26 +0000

In reply to How Democracies Work

Well, maybe considering the thread above the one thing we can all agree upon

I would never call America a

Elusive Trope — Wed, 05 Dec 2012 04:22:06 +0000

In reply to If the majority doesn't want

I would never call America a liberal democracy, when comparing it to modern democracies (as opposed to countries in 16th century). So I can't stop calling it a liberal democracy when i never said it was.

And the the ten commandents? so you want the police to arrest guys for lusting over their neighbor's wife? really?

And the lust for profits can blind people to the reality of the Constitution for a century. Why not another lust for another century. What is your lust?

The National Defense

Aaron Carine — Wed, 05 Dec 2012 01:00:11 +0000

In reply to a "Liberal democracy" such as

The National Defense Authorization Act damages our claim to be a liberal democracy, but I doubt it will survive the challenge in the courts.

If the majority doesn't want

PeraclesPlease — Tue, 04 Dec 2012 23:15:17 +0000

In reply to If I have a right to the

If the majority doesn't want to be so liberal, stop calling it a liberal democracy.

But we had the 10 Commandments since when? You're making it too tough.

The Constitution and system of laws give processes for when the state can take property. Most of the time this is followed. Sometimes it turns ugly, and if it turns ugly too often, we start talking about failed states, corrupt states, crony capitalism, et al - not liberal democracy.

The issue of the Civil War was clear from the beginning - lust for profits trumped liberal democracy in writing the Constitution, so slavery was codified.

If I have a right to the

Elusive Trope — Tue, 04 Dec 2012 22:00:15 +0000

In reply to What? The system of laws is

If I have a right to the pursuit of happiness, then how can a law be developed that infringes on that and still be constitutional? It is because we understand we do not have an absolute right to the pursuit of happiness. We allow for the government to deprive people of their property if it is in the state's interest. And so on. These are the exceptions.

I agree with you about something waterboarding etc and a liberal democracy. But what shall one do when not everyone in your democracy wants it to be so liberal.

If things were so clear and obvious, maybe we wouldn't have to fight a civil war a century after the country adopted the constitution.

What? The system of laws is

PeraclesPlease — Tue, 04 Dec 2012 21:46:46 +0000

In reply to One has a right to liberty,

What? The system of laws is constructed within the Constitution and the bodies that uphold it. If there's a law based on the Constitution to throw you in jail for murder, then it's a legal outcome. There's no "exception" in throwing you in jail for violating laws within the Constitution - it's codified. There are no asterisks however for "exceptions to the rule kosher". There are powers provided to the 3 branches, and then powers retained by the states and the citizenry. There's no "massage it any way you want it" clause.

There simply is no debate over whether waterboarding or indefinite detention form part of a liberal democracy, much less outright murder. They don't. You can wedge them into our accepted practices by hook and by crook, using military tribunals, extraordinary rendition, and other frauds, but by doing so, you're simply declaring and accepting our system of government is less liberally democrat than if we'd maintained values from 13 years ago.

Now there is a way to amend the Constitution in a way less liberally democratic, but in general, our amendments have been positive - Bill of Rights, slavery amendments, women's suffrage.

I would argue that just about

A Guy Called LULU — Tue, 04 Dec 2012 21:16:19 +0000

In reply to a "Liberal democracy" such as

I would argue that just about everyone agrees there is a point in which they will allow the "bad guys" to be deprived of their traditional legal rights by the government.

And there has been shown to be a point quite easy to reach where the comfortably numb will not question the designation and then elimination of 'bad guys' they don't really know anything about. Those guy's designation as bad guys can be done by a secret panel based on secret information acquired from secret sources and their elimination can be justified by secret legal memo's. That is some of the things that we are "allowing", none of which is evidence that we are living in, or even believe in, such a thing as a 'liberal democracy'.

One has a right to liberty,

Elusive Trope — Tue, 04 Dec 2012 21:14:36 +0000

In reply to No, America's example of

One has a right to liberty, but if you commit certain crimes, is is unconstitutional for the state to deprive you of that liberty by tossing you into prison? Is the death penalty constitutional? Some would say it is. I could go on with examples, but the point is that there is an on-going debate in this country about what the Constitution means when it comes to rights and when are the exceptions to the rule kosher. Again to return to my original point - if you refuse to accept that there is this debate, that it simply your interpretation which is right* and the others wrong - you not going to be very effective in persuading others. Maybe persuasion isn't your goal. In which case you should have ignored my original post.

*By and large I would agree with your interpretation that Constitution would support a more liberal democracy than we currently have.