“Fred, perhaps, you should ask your doctor if Praxal is right for you.”

It’s Paxil.

Go Fred!

and his inability to speak extemporaneously.
csdeven on September 21, 2007 at 6:53 PM

I still cannot believe that Fred had the gall – in an radio interview with Laura Ingraham – to take apart Ronald Reagan’s communication skills!

I mean if as Fred says in the interview here (Reagan comments start at 9:45) that really Reagan didn’t have such great communication skills……….
………………well then………..………
“Fred, perhaps, you should ask your doctor if Praxal is right for you.”
.
.
Contrast Fred with the “Great Communicator”.

I understand what the argument is, but I don’t buy it at all. As I wrote above, the federal government and the governments of the states do not exist for their own sake, but for the benefit of the individual constituents who live therein. A state does not have a “voice”, the people who live there do, and they get to define (albeit sometimes incorrectly) what is in the interest of their state. You tip the weakness of your argument by resorting to arguing about the low cost of Senate campaigns for appointed Senators (duh).

I missed a blue-on-blue firefight? Damn.

I see BKennedy couldn’t pass up an attempt to take a few cheap shots at the biggest threat to the Republican policy version of Bill Clinton.

steveegg on September 21, 2007 at 6:37 PM

Guilty as charged, but I’m employing the modified Document Dan Defense: “Cheap, but accurate.”

Also: The 17th? Really? Why?

Big S on September 21, 2007 at 5:50 PM

The original concept of the USA was “a Republic of Republics.” The election of the US House of Representatives insured the people had a voice in the national government. The selection of the members of the US Senate was done to insure the individual States had a voice in the national government. If, and when, a Senator began voting against the interests of his home state, he could be recalled and another selected by his state legislature to properly represent the State’s interests. This would efectively give the govenors of the several States control of the US Senate.

Also, it would negate the need for huge campaign funds to be raised to get elected. Since the only campaigning needed to be done was within the state legislature, no need for TV ads, print ads, etc.

If we thought the government “enforced” rights, we’d want more government so we could have more rights enforced.

trubble on September 21, 2007 at 5:25 PM

Yep, governments do not create rights… they only take them away by legislation.

Thing is, as Thompson says, the baby is not an illegal immigrant, so I do disagree. How exactly would you like to see the citizenship laws defined?

Big S on September 21, 2007 at 5:22 PM

I would start by amending the 14th Amendment. By simply stating that only persons born of US citizens or legal residents, inside the USA or its territories, are legal US citizens; and that no special consideration be given to persons born of foreigners inside the USA and territories.

not enough real men have stood up and demanded them.
conservnut on September 22, 2007 at 1:04 AM

Which is enforcement of rights.

Hollowpoint on September 21, 2007 at 6:24 PM

You’re absolutely right about this, and I wish more people were saying the same thing. The 14th and 17th need to go, not that it’ll ever really happen.

One of the puropses of Government is to limit the individual’s freedoms in order to protect the rights of all the people it serves.

AP just had a knee-jerk anti-theistic reaction. I run across it all the time from evangelical anti-theists. The word God just sets them to barking like a dog baying at the moon.
J/k on the last paragraph, but honestly, AP, you really need to look into the concept of rights a little more closely.

No government ever gave rights to people. Rights were only gained when real men stood up and took them!

csdeven, you talked about the Iranians and Iraqis and how they have rights but can’t enjoy them. They only can’t enjoy them because not enough real men have stood up and demanded them. You can call them “God given” or the “Law of the West” or just the natural order of things. It takes men willing to stand up for them to have them.

AP I think you have been in NYC too long. In this part of the world, we don’t look to government to enforce our rights. We stand up for them ourselves. Sometimes at the voting booth by electing individuals that are like minded. And sometimes by standing up to oppression on our own. That is the attitude that brought about our system and our government. And that is the only way people gain and enforce rights.

The consent of the governed? Rights exist only to the extent that they’re enforceable. God doesn’t enforce rights; only the government does.

Allahpundit on September 21, 2007 at 5:06 PM

You are right in one respect, God does not enforce our rights. But the government does not either. The People do! That is the basis for our system, and too many people like yourself have forgotten that little fact. The power in our system lays with the people and not the central government. That is the basis for our constitution and what the founders intended.

Man’s mind in the source of rights.

God is the source of all government and authority and all mans’ rights. Our constitution and bill of rights LIMIT government they don’t “give” us rights, those come from God. Get is straight folks.

Exit question: Shouldn’t she do a Vent interview with MM? It’d be a friendly audience, it’d get lots of grassroots play, and it’d be a nice introduction to the base via another woman who’s well respected by conservatives. No brainer, right?

Yes, I want Jeri. . . to do a vent, I mean to do a vent.

The consent of the governed? Rights exist only to the extent that they’re enforceable. God doesn’t enforce rights; only the government does.

Allahpundit on September 21, 2007 at 5:06 PM

Ummmm Jefferson would have something to say about that. That little thing about the people.

- The Cat

Pure, unadulterated crap.
Allahpundit on September 21, 2007 at 4:54 PM

I guess this is where the big A gets off the Fred train?

And no interviews with the first ladies in running unless it’s with “all” of them!

Again- review his voting record and you’ll find that he voted pro-life and anti-gun control, and actually maintains those positions rather than reversing course for a campaign.

Hollowpoint on September 21, 2007 at 5:25 PM

1994. Thats what you guys always go back to. 13 years and nothing has changed, M I RITE!

In Europe, charters of liberty have been granted by power. America has set the example . . . of charters of power granted by liberty. This revolution in the practice of the world, may, with an honest praise, be pronounced the most triumphant epoch of its history, and the most consoling presage of its happiness.

John Madison, 1792

Some talked, some wrote, and some fought to promote and establish it, but you and Mr. Jefferson thought for us all. I never take a retrospect of the years 1775 and 1776 without associating your opinions and speeches and conversations with all the great political, moral, and intellectual achievements of the Congress of those memorable years.

Benjamin Rush, 1812 – to John Adams