My proposal would be that you put more funding into a regulated national broadcaster like NPR so it could be something like the BBC and would not be by law allowed to be openly biased. — Baden

I'm actually not the first to argue that the BBC is biased. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_the_BBC

A free press is a check on government power, and it's typical of oppressive governments to control the media. A government imposed law illegalizing bias or even offering a certification for those organizations the government finds unbiased is an oppressive act. You're free to argue the BBC is a straight shooter, but surely you see a problem with the government blocking those news organizations that offer news varying from the BBC's governmentally decreed "unbiased" views.

If we did allow the government to decide what news to report, I propose Trump decide. If not him, then who and why? It's an awfully powerful position, and I hope my side gets chosen to write the history.

Ireland isn't safe because it's neutral. It's safe for the same reason no one steals my shoes from my unlocked gym locker. No one wants it.

Fool yourself into thinking America offers you no protection. It really doesn't matter. They'll protect you anyway.

Not exclusively but regulation works. Ever hear of the BBC? Compare that to the shitshow that is CNN and Fox. — Baden

What regulations do you propose on CNN and Fox?

The US press will generally give you a pass if you do something like support or ignore Israel murdering Palestinians, generally just kill lots of brown people in the middle East for whatever reason, or support dictators, warlords who do so in whatever way it serves your interest etc. — Baden

What color were the Nazis and the Russians?

There's nothing moral about sitting on the sidelines criticizing the one keeping you safe at night.

The vast majority of your news is privately owned, private owners have private interests, and there's no regulation concerning bias, — Baden

And the solution is a government run press?

What about the needless and predicable chaos and death he recently caused in the Middle East? Oh that? — Sapientia

Obama dropped 26,071 bombs in 2016 alone. Oh that? https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/jan/09/america-dropped-26171-bombs-2016-obama-legacy

give this guy a medal. Better yet, a meeting with the Queen and a Nobel Peace Prize. — Sapientia

Actually, Obama did get a Nobel Peace Prize.

And so the Clintons were worse and the press gave them a pass. This offeris support for Trump's attack on the press, right?

If the press is in the business of supporting candidates, then candidates ought attack those supporting their opponents.

I don't so much have his back as much as I see someone not doing the harm imagined and burping and farting at the most solemn events and really entertaining me to no end.

The economy is booming, he's tough talking, but not declaring wars, is right that we need major immigration reform, and is picking some splendid Supreme Court candidates who are willing to rein in the over-interpretation of the Constitution.

Agreed. As I said, he needs to stfu now. — Baden

Why this advice to change course? His followers are delighted and his detractors outraged.

Yes, more outrage is in order. Hear hear. Sic the newsmen on him. That should do. Never abandon a failed strategy.

we will mercilessly take the piss out of him in every way possible — Baden

A few more scathing editorials and he'll be begging for mercy I'm sure.

Do you even read the comment sections on facebook, which was now undeniably exploited by some intelligence agencies (Russian GRU, according to the latest indictments of the Mueller investigation), to stoke fears to unseen levels, among an already frightened and paranoid electorate of the US population. — Posty McPostface

The streets, once filled with daily commuters, now filled with pandemonium, bedlam, and mayhem, brought about from a few well written tweets and Facebook posts.

To be fair, this does display a double standard of dramatic proportions. Consider an attempt to apply such humor upon his predecessor.

Here's how this goes: Trump declares himself huuugely popular, his detractors point to his huuuge opposition, his detractors are reminded that he really is huuugely popular, his detractors then attack his supporters. Then (see above) more and more clever comments are shouted in the echo chamber. The right and left take turns cheering and booing. The most annoying of all are those who really think they're objective.

At this point you can only consider pointing out that fact as tantamount to trolling... — Posty McPostface

In a last ditch effort to silence those who fail to see the wisdom of your tired criticisms, you decry the truth as trolling. Nope, Trump's victory was in fact huuuge, devestating to his opponents, and it will shape politics for generations.

I think this protest is bigger than his inaugaration: — Michael

Let me count the votes that matter: 304 in favor of Trump, 270 in favor of Clinton.

Or not. That's the other potential outcome.

You can't go back and change it so who cares? — frank

You don't know what I can do.

Trump would literally have to defecate in your MAGA cap for you to change your vote, so unless I can get him to do that, I'm not expecting a different answer from you, or any Trump vote — Baden

Trump is too classy to take a hat shit.

Another typical example of Trump admin corruption: Ryan Zinke charged taxpayers $139,000 dollars to fix three doors in his office. — Baden

It's outrageous no doubt, but you've not drawn a link back from the door repair man to Zinke. It's possible that the person who hired the door fixer man was hooking a friend up, getting a kick-back, or paid so little attention to things that people ran amok. It's possible Zinke orchestrated the whole thing, but also possible he didn't know. We can speculate, be cynical, be naïve, be supportive, be critical, be whatever. All I can say is that if I had it to do all over again and could rethink my vote, I'd vote for Trump again.

Last off point comment, I promise, but what's worse than a live squirrel on your piano?

A dead beaver on your organ.

Coca cola was invented in Atlanta and the world headquarters is here. The reason people drink it is because it's delicious. People die from haters like you, not from a can of Coke. Coke does nothing but bring people together.

What are we to make of this? — Banno

That he is capable of communicating so effectively that he's been able to have secured the most competitive political position in the world, and you lack the comprehension to comprehend him or those who comprehend him.

As Dylan said, "Don't criticize what you can't understand."

By the way, I'm just wondering. If a mod bans someone wrongfully, and everyone realizes that there was no reason that person was banned, can that person be unbanned, and what happens to the mod that banned him? — René Descartes

It can happen, but the ressurected soul will be eternally burdened with the tagline "previously damned." It's only fair.

Punishment for banning wrongly will be dinner with Hanover, unless it's Hanover, in which case, dinner with Hanover's wife. — Baden

Whatever must I do to be your dinner?

By the way, we're going to close discussion on this banning within 24h to avoid going off-topic, so if anyone else has anything to add, please do so within that time. — Baden

The 18 hours or so I have left should be sufficient for all I have to say, which is just about the length of stored episodes of South Park on my DVR, so I'll multi-task while watching.

DPMartin was banned. Here's the exchange:

Hanover:

Please edit your posts and capitalize the first letter of each sentence, per our rules:

"Posts should display an acceptable level of English with regard to grammar, punctuation and layout."

Nothing personal. All your posts are appreciated, and I realize you might be using your phone to post and capitalizing is cumbersome, but such are the rules.

Thanks!
Hanover

a day ago

Hanover:
I previously asked that you edit your posts to properly capitalize, and I see that you have not done that. I also see that you have continued to create additional posts that don't comply with our rules. I will need for you to go back and edit your non-complying posts and for you to respond to this PM and assure me that you will comply in the future. If you don't do both of these things, you will be banned.

22 hours ago

DPMartin:

when you start paying me for services to your satisfaction, then I'll worry about such things as grammar to your satisfaction. you can always, not read what I post, you have that right you know.

11 minutes ago

As a result, he was banned.

There should be no such special rights for someone just because of their skin color or religion or ethnicity within a nation's laws. — raza

I think the minority member's argument would be that they ought be protected from discrimination based upon their minority status and laws need to be passed to that effect.

A rock's mass, size and shape, and molecular arrangement don't depend on how humans perceive a rock. — Marchesk

This is a return to Locke's primary and secondary qualities distinction, which I think is ultimately arbitrary. Your knowledge of mass, for example, would be the sensation of its weight or perhaps your observation of a numeric representation on a scale. The same could be said of size and molecular arrangement. All that you know is what you perceive. To assert that there exists something beyond appearances is just a declaration of realism, but you have nothing to base that on. And even if we were to agree that there was an external rock with all sorts of physical characteristics that exist independent of perception, we could not begin to know or explain what those raw characteristics were because all we could refer to are the impressions of our senses.

This account, in terms of endorsement and it's withholding, has the advantage of rendering talk of appearances as derivative or parasitic upon 'is' claims (claims of reality). That is, if this account is right, then we must first be acquainted with reality (or 'things in reality') prior to being acquainted with appearances; for to be able to withhold endorsement about claims (by saying 'it seems...') presupposes that we can already speak of things as they are. Following Sellars, there is thus a logical priority of reality over appearence, and thus no need to engage with the hand-wringing over how to 'get from mere appearance to reality'. — StreetlightX

This doesn't resolve the result of Cartesian doubt. It ignores it. It is obvious that we all consider external reality obvious. Forrest Gump has no doubt he is holding a box of chocolates. It takes someone who is willing to examine the nature of reality some effort to convince himself that there might not really be a rock before him. And so Descartes' contribution was to examine this question and to doubt everything and then to locate which could not be doubted. He realized that he could not doubt appearances, could not doubt he was doubting, and therefore could not doubt he exists. That much is right.

The point here is that we are not first acquainted with things as they are; we are first acquainted with things how we think they are. We don't realize the distinction between things as we think they are and how they actually are until we engage in some amount of introspection, but that's how so much of what we know is. It's sort of like any Socratic discussion. We start with some unexamined claim and through questioning and probing we arrive at a more sophisticated and perhaps accurate response.

The problem with getting from mere appearance to reality is that of incoherence. It is not possible to describe an object without reference to appearance (or some other sensation), so to ask how can I know the rock without reference to how it looks, smells, or taste seems nonsensical. The problem then isn't that we can't know reality prior to appearance, but we can't even discuss a reality without appearances.

Then how is it I can tell the difference between the two?

Christianity is alive and well.

The tradition in the USA is a strong emphasis on 1 and 3 but there's no good argument as to why this should be the case. — Benkei

I think a good argument is that you ought allow the will of the democracy be expressed to the greatest extent possible and that you employ the non-democratic hammer of the Constitution only when you have a clear cut instance of democratic overreach. Since the Court has no external check, judicial self-restraint is a required virtue, else you have 5 philosopher kings running the nation. The liberal meltdown is justified now that Trump can create a Court in his image, but that's only because the Court has too much power.

So, I do think a good argument is that an interpretive system be adopted that limits the creative aspect of the Justices, which would mean limiting the interpretation to the words as they were used instead of looking for Constitutional themes and writing new chapters that appear to fit the theme the Justice deciphered.

My guess is that you'd have some affinity for a limited Court, considering the Dutch system is able to navigate without a Constitutional Court at all. The Court as protector against majority tyranny is greatly overstated. The best you can say is that the Court is generally good at reading the direction of the democracy and forcing issues sometimes sooner than some would prefer.

There is no security. It is a vain quest. — unenlightened

There is no absolute safety, but varying degrees, and it sounds like where you live is relatively peaceful, especially compared to other areas of the world. And the truth is that those tools of mass destruction and death you saw on display form a good part of the reason you are so safe.

But such is always the case or at least should be. We carry with us foundational principles we adhere to and from that we create a consistent world view. How is it that the subject of ethics creates less a challenge to you than your question of what is law? Belief in God, for example will similarly shape the ethical theory you accept.

That's like saying that because historical people referred to the mentally ill as being possessed by demons then the meaning of the phrase "possessed by demons" at that time meant "mentally ill". But of course that's wrong. It meant what it means now. They were just wrong to refer to the mentally ill as being possessed by demons — Michael

This isn't really analogous. We would derive their meaning through use, and mentally ill would refer to those with particular behaviors. Their definition of being possessed by demons is empirically incorrect. If I declare X, Y, and Z "liberties," we can arrive at their underlying definition by analyzing how they use that term, but unfortunately there is no empirical reference for us to determine if their self-proclaimed meaning were correct.

And historical people didn't refer to slavery as being immoral. Does it then follow that the meaning of the word "immoral" has changed, and that slavery isn't immoral as they meant by the word? Or is it that the meaning is the same, and they were just wrong to not refer to slavery as immoral? — Michael

If they offer a definition of "moral" that is at odds with how they're using it, then we can say their stated definition is wrong. If you're equating "liberty" with "moral," I think you're on to something, and my objection is very clear that 5 people don't need to be philosopher kings telling 100s of millions of Americans what is right and wrong. That's what the ballot box is for.

No, I'm deriving it from the facts that a) liberty is a right and b) sodomy is a liberty. — Michael

What is the principle you adhere to that I can use to determine what is a liberty though? Is cat ownership a liberty and why or why not?

So it would be appropriate in regard to the way we have worked out the role of the Supreme Court to ask if our judges have been doing a good job of identifying what is beneficial to the American society. I'd say they have pretty good track record. And if they fail, as I said, Congress can rectify that. — frank

The democratic check on the Supreme Court is very limited and onerous, requiring Constitutional amendment. If that were your attitude, you wouldn't care who sits on the Court, considering we can just undo it with an amendment.

I think you're grumbling about some democratic principle. I would say a woman has a right to an abortion. I think you agree, but you think it would be better if the whole society continues to suffer because of the inability of congressmen to amend the constitution. I honestly don't understand that attitude. — frank

This is the crux of the entire debate: What is the appropriate role of the Court and how does it affect our democracy? If we are being ruled by 5 justices, we're not an effective democracy. The role of Congress is to consider matters of policy.

You're denying that Virginia's statues contain the Magna Carta? — frank

No. I asked for the cite to it because I couldn't find the specific statute you were alluding to. I trust your statement, but I'd like to see it for academic sake. It'd be interesting to see how their courts have dealt with such ancient references.

I think this is the wrong way to understand language. You and a slave owner might mean the same thing by “moral” but disagree on which things are moral. So we and the people of 1866 might mean the same thing by “liberty” but disagree on which things are a liberty. The original meaning interpretation of the Constitution requires that we consider what the people who wrote it meant by the term, and presumably it meant what it does now, even if we have a different understanding of which things are covered by that meaning. — Michael

The only way we can possibly ascertain the meaning of a word used in 1866 is by looking to how it was used. And what we know is that liberty did not include the right to abort, to intermarry, to engage in sodomy, and to marry someone of your same gender. I think it's clear that the word "liberty" means something quite different today than when it was written. You seem to be saying that it means the same today as before, but how do you know that if all indications are that they meant something far different.

But let's clarify, what is meant by "liberty," and how would I know if I have a right to cat ownership? My guess is that I don't, largely because it's not a hot-button issue for the left and it doesn't have to do with relationships or sexuality in some way. As far as I can tell, the unenumerated 11th right is the right to marry, to have sex with whoever I want, to have whatever sort of sex with I want, and to discard the remains of that sexual encounter without government interference. Isn't that really what "liberty" really is here? And when I look at the enumerated rights, this 11th right doesn't seem to flow that well with the other rights, like the right to free speech, the right against illegal searches and seizures, the right to counsel, and the right to be free from cruel and unusual punishment. I mean, really, you derived the right to have sodomy by extrapolating from the other amendments?

You just did a wonderful job of explaining how we currently understand what the 9th and 14th Amendments mean, so obviously they aren't meaningless. If some familiarity with precedents is required to fully understand the law, that's business as usual. — frank

What does "liberty" mean and how is it being used in the various cases I cited? When faced with a novel issue regarding whether something is a substantive right, how do I go about that analysis so that I might expect my conclusion would be consistent with someone else's? If there is not standard to determine what is a substantive right, how can I ever say someone was right or wrong in their conclusion?

Thomas Jefferson was asked to rewrite the statues of Virginia after the revolution (it was known that Virginia's law would become the model all the states would follow). Jefferson refused, saying that every word in a law code is the beneficiary of generations of lawyerly wrangling and it would be wrong to curse future lawyers with having to wrangle over a totally new set of words. So Jefferson knew that the meaning of the words continually evolves — frank

That's not what Jefferson was saying. America inherited its laws from England and part of the common law tradition is that judges interpret the meaning of laws and render binding legal opinions explaining what the laws mean. His point is well taken, that if you write a whole new set of laws, you're going to discard perhaps hundred of years of precedent clarifying the meaning of those laws. This doesn't point to the evolving meaning of words, but actually the opposite, which is that over time the meaning of statutes become more clear and more well defined based upon precedent. Courts reversing themselves and changing the meaning of terms does occur from time to time, but that can be based on all sorts of things and the role of stare decisis is a matter of debate.

I don't really see what Jefferson is saying here is applicable to how judges are to extract meaning from terms. Jefferson's comment relates to the significance of precedent. Our question deals with Constitutional interpretation and what standards you use to determine meaning from words.

Virginia's law still includes the Magna Carta, which most certainly is not interpreted today the way it was in 1215. Would you seriously hold that it should be? — frank

You'll have to give the cite to where the Virginia Code contains excerpts from the Magna Carta translated from its medieval Latin so I can see exactly what you're talking about.. As your Jefferson quote made clear, the US did accept the common law interpretations from the English courts and you can find such references in very old cases. So, yes, if there were a situation that cited a Virginia statute that originated with the Magna Carta and there were ancient court interpretations of those rules, that would be helpful in deriving meaning of the statute. Of course there's over 800 years of additional interpretation that needs to be considered as well.

The problem, though, is that the Constitution doesn't define "life", "liberty", "property", or "speech", so how can the Supreme Court determine if a law wrongly infringes on these rights? If the Constitution doesn't tell us what these things are, and if it's wrong to infer anything that isn't explicit in the Constitution, then such rights are effectively meaningless. — Michael

The slippery slope of your position is that nothing can be explicit because if we don't know what life, liberty, property, and speech is, we don't know what slavery is either and so maybe they were never emancipated, and maybe we don't know what we're saying to each other right now either.

Anyway, there are variety ways of interpreting words, one of which is to look at how "liberty" was used in 1866 when it was used, and it most clearly did not refer to abortion or sodomy. It's also possible to set up a standard that can be followed, but the Court is reluctant to do that because they want that to change that as well over time. My point here being that they've not defined liberty, they've given us some examples of it.

Why doesn't my right to "liberty" include the right to own a cat? If you can make a legitimate case for why it would be unconstitutional for the state to regulate my right to cat ownership under the 14th Amendment, have you not made the Constitution pretty meaningless? What is the Court's working definition of "liberty" and why does it include abortion but not assisted suicide, sodomy, but not the right to work 70 hours per week?

The road we're going down? If we are in fact on that road, then give me an example. What part of the constitution has become meaningless due to loose interpretation? — frank

And this responds to @Michael's post as well regarding substantive due process.

A quick history of this. The 14th amendment was passed following the Civil War in 1866 that stated, "nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law."

In historical context it appears to mean that you can't take people's stuff or deprive them of basic freedom without first giving them a fair trial and opportunity to be heard. In fact, that's how it was interpreted initially and it was referred to as the right to procedural due process. The Amendment was then used to make some of the Bill of Rights applicable against the states (but not all). That is, it was asserted that some of the basic liberties set forth in the Bill of Rights were instances of "liberty" that a state could not deprive you of. A couple of notable examples where a state can deprive you of a right listed in the Bill of Rights are the right to a trial by jury in a civil suit and the right to a grand jury (the federal government cannot deprive you of such a right in a federal proceeding).

The idea of making sure all people receive fair trials makes sense in the historical context of blacks having just been emancipated and the idea of making the federal constitution applicable to the states makes sense since in the historical context of the states in rebellion having just been brought back into the union.

So far so good. The issue is that if the Court has recognized that certain enumerated rights are applicable to the states, it can now start deciding which unenumerated rights will become applicable to the states because the 9th Amendment says that there are some rights not enumerated. And this is where this concept of substantive due process derives (as opposed to procedural due process), which is that we can now look for other unenumerated liberties and demand that the state protect them.

Fast forward to 1905 with the Lochner case, a case striking down economic regulations that were intended to protect workers by limiting how long they could work in a given week. That case said it was unconstitutional to regulate how a worker could decide how he wished to freely contract to labor. There were additional Supreme Court cases that followed that similarly protected economic substantive due process, but in 1937 that era ended with a case striking down Lochner and making clear that the Court would allow employment regulation and it would exercise great caution in locating new unenumerated rights.

Fast forward to 1965, which is when the Court found a rejuvenated interest in finding unenumerated rights, changing course from the era of caution. Moving through the 60s and 70s, it was determined that some of the unenumerated rights that we had were the right to use contraception, the right for interracial couples to marry, the right to abortion, and the right to engage in sodomy (that was in the 90s) It was found however that we don't have the right to state assisted suicide.

In the 1960s, it was decided that there would be no specific formula for deciphering these rights, but the Court was just to make a case by case assessment. In 1997, a case indicated that the Court ought to recognize those unenumerated rights "deeply rooted in the in the Nation’s history and traditions” and “implicit in the concept of ordered liberty.” However, this formula was not used in 2015 when it was determined that gay marriage was an unenumerated right.

So, to answer your question: The 14th Amendment has become meaningless due to loose interpretation. The 14th Amendment states a state may not deprive you of contraception, intermarriage, abortion, sodomy, or gay marriage. You may however be deprived of the right to a jury trial in a civil case, the right to a grand jury, the right to contract to labor however you want, and the right to assisted suicide. There is no formula for deciding where these rights come from, but it's left up to the decision of the Justices.

That hardly sounds like they're following rules or laws, but just sort of deciding. And they don't just make generalized holdings like "you have the right to an abortion." They say, "you have the right to an abortion in the first trimester" and they lay out a very specific rule, as if all of that is a sacred right.

I think the rule is very clear, though, in how unenumerated rights are found. You simply look at the prevailing view of the political left and you declare it right and just and you enshrine it in the Constitution. It then becomes a moral statement decreed by their atheistic god or something and it stands forever immovable. I think it's clear that the Court is just looking to public sentiment when it finds these rights and they change with the political climate. That's not interpretation of a document. That's just what a good politician does.

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Hence the due process. Liberties can be restricted if doing so serves some greater good, and the case was made that the closer to viability the more reason there is to restrict this liberty. — Michael

This is confusing. There are two types of due process: procedural and substantive. Procedural due process requires, at a minimum, notice and hearing before you can be deprived of something you were otherwise entitled to. For instance, you have the right to a fair proceeding before they send you to jail or fine you or take your property. Substantive due process simply describes where the legislative power ends and there is a right you are entitled to. It is subject to much debate. You seem to be arguing that the trimester system is a type of procedural due process, but it's not. I see what you're saying, that the trimester system is a way of making abortions fair, but really the trimester system is a description of the actual right that was extrapolated somehow from the Constitution, describing where the State's interest in regulating abortion begins and ends.

Although your argument here is less a case for abortion not being a liberty and more a case against allowing abortion to be restricted even in the latest stages. — Michael

My argument is entirely one of whether abortion is a right set out in the Constitution. I am pro-choice and believe a better society is one that allows abortion, having no real objection to the trimester framework. I just submit it's a legislative function to make such laws and it's disingenuous, intellectually dishonest, and an over-reach by a non-democratic body to claim they found the right to abortion in our highest, most controlling document that trumps (not Donald) everything else.