Comment by graycat | Hacker News Reader

Comment by graycat | Hacker News Reader

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Fix it? Sure, the US Founding Fathers had all been there, done that, gotten the T-shirt, and showed us how:

(1) Have freedom of the press so that the press can put out the information needed for an informed citizenry.

(2) Have freedom of speech and assembly so that the citizens can learn, discuss, and decide.

(3) Have the Bill of Rights so that the government can't just run roughshod over the citizens.

(4) Have three branches of government so that there can be checks and balances and keep, say, the Executive Branch from becoming dictatorial, self-serving, self-perpetuating, and tyrannical.

(5) Have the President and the Congress elected by the citizens, directly or nearly so and, thus, have them elected out'a there when the citizens don't like them.

Then, presto, to solve the problems, citizens just need to become informed and, then, behind some curtains pull some levers. Done. All the powerful, wealthy, connected, crooked dirt bags in government float belly down down the Potomac River.

Net, we just need to become informed and pull the levers.

And, there's another way: Bring law suits, e.g., citing the Fourth Amendment.

So,

Q. Go to war in Syria?

A. Not without money voted by Congress.

Q. Implement ObamaCare?

A. Not if the citizens and/or courts don't like it.

Q. NSA spying on US citizens?

A. Not if citizens vote to stop that stuff and/or court cases get brought and are successful.

Q. The spying on US citizens as in the OP?

A. Not if citizens don't like it and/or there are suitable court cases.

Q. US Customs taking mobile electronic devices of US citizens and extracting and keeping all the data?

A. Not if, right, the usual, citizens and courts stop it.

Etc.

(1) Have freedom of the press so that the press can put out the information needed for an informed citizenry.

At the time the bill of rights was written, the term "press" did not refer to any sort of news organization. It meant a literal press - the idea was that publication by anyone with the means to publish was not to be restricted.

Nowadays everyone has the modern equivalent of a press so it is unfortunate that the meaning of "press" has been narrowed to a poorly-defined set of semi-official news distributing organizations.

Good! Now with blogs we can return to the original meaning!

The US government is flawed on a deep constitutional level. The incentive structures and oversight mechanisms are broken. The constitution is pretty much a joke at this point. The founders knew it would become outdated quickly and recommended rewriting it every 25 years or so.

> The founders knew it would become outdated quickly and recommended rewriting it every 25 years or so.

Interesting! Where was this mentioned -- in their personal correspondence, or a more public document?

It's a concept rather than a specific quote: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Living_Constitution

Here's the well-known rationale from Thomas Jefferson: http://press-pubs.uchicago.edu/founders/documents/v1ch2s23.h...

And if none of that was enough, have enough guns to force a regime change.

I continually don't understand this argument. Any group of armed and motivated people intending on taking down the government would be stopped, one way or another, before they can assemble a well-organised militia. The presence of guns might make you safer in a number of narrow scenarios but not against anything as large as a state-wide police force, let alone the US Army.

You see to forget that the height of military technology of the day was the Kentucky or Pennsylvania long rifle.

The militia was intended to be the primary form of military organization.

Fundamentally, an armed citizenry was to be the final check against the abuse of power by the state.

The Iraqis managed to kick us out with rifles and improvised mines. Not even a single artillery piece, armored vehicle, aircraft, nor any technology less than 50 years old, against $2 Trillion worth of US anti-insurgency doctrine.

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