Re: POL: Extropianism and Politics

Michael S. Lorrey (mike@lorrey.com)
Fri, 19 Mar 1999 12:59:29 -0500

Terry Donaghe wrote:

> ---Billy Brown <bbrown@conemsco.com> wrote:
> >
> > Sure - a constitutional republic. We used to have one of those in
> the US,
> > but that hasn't been the case for about 70 - 100 years (depending on
> where
> > you draw the line). The crucial feature is that the central
> government
> > should not have the power to do most of the things that special
> interests
> > would care about.
> >
> Can such a government keep itself from travelling down the same road
> that we have? Is there any way to prevent the slide into
> bigstatism/socialism with democracy???

The one weakness I feel the US Constitution has is that it lacks an explicit glossary. There should be a glossary of simple definitions that are hard to misunderstand. Additionally, there should be a clause saying that the constitution is to be interpreted literally, not figuratively, not incrementally, not subjectively, and no more or no less than exactly what is said.

Much of the devolution of our system occured because the courts have found new meanings in the words, ignoring the original intent, and they even have invented new interpretations that are literally baseless.

Mike Lorrey