Dena:

You need to read the Anti Federalist Papers NOW! The founding fathers (of the Constitution) wrote the Federalist Papers and they were very much for BIG government. It was the Anti Federalists who wrote the Bill of Rights which limited the powers. Remember the Constitution was adopted without the Bill of Rights!

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yes the founding fathers were forced to give the "people" a bone when it came to the bill of rights. I still haven't figured out what exactly the 9th is supposed to do.

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In a rich man's house there is no place to spit but his face.
Diogenes Of Sinope

yes the founding fathers were forced to give the "people" a bone when it came to the bill of rights. I still haven't figured out what exactly the 9th is supposed to do.

It is the reason that all these rights exist. Without it, no right except one mentioned need exist for citizens. It is by far any away the most important, and the most misunderstood and trampled upon.

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Welfare and social security didnt put the country into such deep depth. the Demand that taxes be lowered and spending increased did. Which President gave us that governing philosophy? Social security and medicare have paid for themselves for years. Had the gov't not borrowed its(social security's) funding like some corporation that got ahold of its employees pension fund, then we could all smile and agree that somethings are better left alone.

you do remember that CLinton had setup a 10 year plan. The one where the gov't would be fiscally responsible, be innovative, cut costs, and account for every penny. We were supposed to be out of debt by now. Hmmmm what happened?

Someone took the $1 trillion in surplus and instead of paying back the debt. he handed it back to us. well that debt got worse after we got into 2 wars. Wars where the word fiscal and responsible never met. Quarterly emergency spending bills to pay for the wars made the requested budget look lean and mean yet we spent $100"s of Billions backdooring the wars financing. This is pretty dishonest and it shows when you look at the current debt levels.

I blame the wealthy and their wealth consolidating tax breaks(presents) they got that crippled the gov't in a time of war and increased the national debt beyond record levels. BTW W is the first president to actually hand out tax breaks to anyone during a time of war. War requires cash. the gov't gets cash from taxes. the gov't gets more tax money when it doesnt cut taxes to the rich. Some one may want to explain that to W because I really don't think he's ever gotten that concept.

I do blame congressmen and women that are more worried about getting reelected than doing the right thing for the country. As much as I hate taxes I wouldn't mind paying a bit more if someone could get a budget under control

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In a rich man's house there is no place to spit but his face.
Diogenes Of Sinope

From "New Deal or Raw Deal" page 117
While some Americans were soaked by social security, others especially the first retirees, rolled into benefits after making only minimal payments. Ida Fuller, for example, a legal secretary in ludlow, Vermont, payed a total of $24.75 into social security from 1937 to 1940, when she retired at age sixty-five. Her first monthly social security check of $22.54 almost matched her entire contribution. At her death in 1975 she had received $22,888.92 from social security, a payout of roughly $1,000 for every dollar she payed in.

We are currently reaching the point where there are two workers for each person on social security. As there was never a trust fund from day one, where do you think the money is going to come from to pay all of these people?

Social Security has been nothing more than the largest Ponzi Scheme ever run. I have been maxing out my IRA and 401k (if I have one) for years because I don't expect to see anything from the government and I only have about 3 years before I qualify. I suspect I will not retire until some time between 70 and 80 because without Social Security I will not have the money to live till I am between 100 and 110 (my family is long lived). Also to reduce my expenses, I have a condo that is payed off. It's not big but it's far better than renting.

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Someone took the $1 trillion in surplus and instead of paying back the debt. he handed it back to us. well that debt got worse after we got into 2 wars. Wars where the word fiscal and responsible never met. Quarterly emergency spending bills to pay for the wars made the requested budget look lean and mean yet we spent $100"s of Billions backdooring the wars financing. This is pretty dishonest and it shows when you look at the current debt levels.

I blame the wealthy and their wealth consolidating tax breaks(presents) they got that crippled the gov't in a time of war and increased the national debt beyond record levels. BTW W is the first president to actually hand out tax breaks to anyone during a time of war. War requires cash. the gov't gets cash from taxes. the gov't gets more tax money when it doesnt cut taxes to the rich. Some one may want to explain that to W because I really don't think he's ever gotten that concept.

Interesting:
Defense spending as % of Federal Budget
1960 - 55%
1970 - 48%
1980 - 28%
1990 - 27%
2000 - 20%
2010 - 24%

Source: http://www.usgovernmentspending.com/#usgs302a

Someone might say that defense spending has remained rather stable, war or not, since we bailed from Vietnam. If that is true, then the deficit must lie elsewhere.

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2000 was a clinton budget. the years between 2001 and 2008 they were using emergency spending which wasnt reflected in the actual budget. it made military spending close to 50% of all gov't spending

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In a rich man's house there is no place to spit but his face.
Diogenes Of Sinope

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2000 was a clinton budget. the years between 2001 and 2008 they were using emergency spending which wasnt reflected in the actual budget. it made military spending close to 50% of all gov't spending

Really?
Spending numbers on defense for those years. Same source.
2001 - 20%
2002 - 21%
2003 - 22%
2004 - 24%
2005 - 24%
2006 - 23%
2007 - 24%
2008 - 24%
2009 - 23%

Want a heart attack? (It might be covered)

Source Congressional Budget Office.

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I'll repeat it slowly so you can understand. BUsh asked for "emergency" spending to cover the costs of the wars. The emergency spending conveniently doesn't go under defense spending and makes the military seem efficient when in reality its spending like a meth head that won the lottery. People see the enormous deficit from Obamas first budget and scream bloodly murder. What you don't see is Congress being forced into wasting time passing stopgap bills to cover the cost of 2 wars that aren't accounted for in the Defense budget.

CLearly Bush is a student of history. He did the same thing that Johnson did with the Viet nam war. The only difference was the massive price tag we've put on the wars

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In a rich man's house there is no place to spit but his face.
Diogenes Of Sinope

I'll repeat it slowly so you can understand. BUsh asked for "emergency" spending to cover the costs of the wars. The emergency spending conveniently doesn't go under defense spending and makes the military seem efficient when in reality its spending like a meth head that won the lottery.

If it wasn't under defense what was it under? This mythical extra 25% you speak of. Education? Welfare? Pensions? Social security? Medicare? By the time all the rest is listed there isn't room for another 25%! And these are spent figures, not budget numbers, so they have been corrected to place any emergency spending legislation in the correct category.

http://www.usgovernmentspending.com/numbers

All federal outlays prior to 2009 (state and local since 2006) are actual.

Perhaps the persons who told you it was 50% of spending were misinformed themselves.

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the numbers seem odd. Then I realized that this is looking at Everything that is spent. when you eliminate non discressionary spending(Social security, national debt etc. you come out seeing that the Military gobbled up a great deal of money that was left in the budget. We'd also need to look at the budgets that Bush wanted and what was spent in the end. Every year you'd see the dishonest numbers for military spending being asked for and at the end of the fiscal year you'd see the actual spending. Bush repeatedly made light of his "lean" budgets. Then turn around and beg for $250 billion every quarter for the wars.

From wikipedia US GOVT Budget

U.S. Military Budget - War on Terror Base Spending : The War on Terror (WoT) incurs additional costs by other departments. When added to the DoD base spending, the amount comes to:

$474 billion in FY 2006, which is 56% of net discretionary spending,
$505 billion in FY 2007, and
$554 billion in FY 2008, nearly 60% of discretionary spending.
FY 2006 Supplemental Funding : The Defense Department base budget also does not include “one time only” costs attributable to the War on Terror, which are submitted as Supplemental Funding.
In FY 2006, an additional $153 billion in Supplemental Funding was added to the base budget - the War on Terror received $120 billion, while $33 billion went primarily for Hurricane Katrina. As a result, 60% of last year's discretionary spending went to DoD/WoT.
FY 2007 Supplemental Funding : For FY 2007, $70 billion has already been approved, while the President’s FY 2008 Budget requests an additional $102 billion. If approved by Congress, total FY 2007 spending for DoD/WoT would be $673 billion, or 64% of the net discretionary budget.
FY 2008 Budget Proposal : For FY 2008, the President has requested the following:
The Defense Department Base Budget - $481 billion.
WoT(non-DoD) Base Budget - $73 billion.
Supplemental Funding for WoT - $145 billion.
Total requested Dod/WoT spending is $699 billion, or 65% of total net Discretionary spending.

notice that the percentages keep increasing

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In a rich man's house there is no place to spit but his face.
Diogenes Of Sinope

Is the constitution a set of rules to live by or as the progressives believe a document that can be interpreted how ever you feel. Read this to see someone who feels the words of the constitution are not important.

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{At age 39, Liu has compiled an impressive resume: Rhodes Scholar, Supreme Court clerk, top grades at both Stanford University and Yale Law School and now law professor University of California, Berkeley.

Liu has also aligned himself with progressive legal groups, including the American Constitution Society, where he is chairman of the board of directors.}


Republicans hate smart people

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I do not fight fascists because I think I can win.
I fight them because they are fascists.
Chris Hedges

A riot is the language of the unheard. -Martin Luther King, Jr.

IF you look at the amendments you'll see that it has to adapt. Its not set in stone. Now if you live in Texas you'll note that any and everything has to be brought up as an amendment to the states constitution. The Texas founding fathers were either in a hurry or wanted someone else to do the footwork on the Constitution. Its a turd. we currently have 467 amendments to the state constitution. this tells me they didnt bother deciding anything. Lazy people just plain lazy

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In a rich man's house there is no place to spit but his face.
Diogenes Of Sinope

Would someone tell me how you can follow the law when the meaning of the law depends on what Judge you happen to be in front of? That's the problem with a living constitution. The founding fathers understood that they may not have it right so they provided for the ability to amend the constitution but they made it hard to change so we wouldn't end up with 467 amendments in a few years. I don't know the Texas rules for amendments, but it sounds like the process is to easy.

On the other hand, it may be time for Texas to sit down and have another Constitutional convention. We in California are kicking around the idea as well because our Constitution is the reason why the state has some of it's current problems.

I don't think most people have problems with people being smart. What I have trouble with is smart people turn their brains on and off as needed. When a smart person comes up with a really dumb idea because their brain is turned off, everybody assumes it must be a good idea because they are smart. Smart people make mistakes and it's your fault if you blindly follow one without using your own head.

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I don't like it either. I'd rather have a law that was clear and concise. Yet we get Lawyers and judges that insist on changing things. This isn't just about liberals either its Conservatives, too. Lawyers and Judges take it upon themselves to interpret laws instead of asking for clarification from the people that enacted the law. I Don't like seeing laws that work and have worked repealed but an activist court. Currently, the Supreme court doesnt look all that supreme when you get 5-4 decisions. Check the old records. most were 7-2 8-1 and even 9-0 on every case. This seems to me that the current court cares less about concensus of and in the law and more about changing it to their liking

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In a rich man's house there is no place to spit but his face.
Diogenes Of Sinope

Currently, the Supreme court doesnt look all that supreme when you get 5-4 decisions. Check the old records. most were 7-2 8-1 and even 9-0 on every case. This seems to me that the current court cares less about concensus of and in the law and more about changing it to their liking

That, or the hairs that are being split are getting finer.

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Currently, the Supreme court doesnt look all that supreme when you get 5-4 decisions. Check the old records. most were 7-2 8-1 and even 9-0 on every case. This seems to me that the current court cares less about concensus of and in the law and more about changing it to their liking

That, or the hairs that are being split are getting finer.

It appears to me that it's the difference between living and non-living constitution views of the judges. We have been getting more judges selected by progressive presidents shifting the balance toward a living constitution.
There are acceptations to this for issues that are not constitutional based like abortion or gay marriage where I have no idea how the judges can make a decision on anything other than personal opinion.

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I'd think just the opposite about judges again. THe republicans made a game out of not doing their job. CLinton would pick a judge for a federal bench and the Conservatives wouldn't start a hearing for the judge. thus preventing him from taking the bench. Of course the Dems did the same to Bush to a lesser degree. However we've attained a much more stringent and conservative supreme court. It defies logic how they can toss out decisions that stood for over 100 years and call every Supreme Court Judge before them a liar and false. This is the definition of activism in the Courts

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In a rich man's house there is no place to spit but his face.
Diogenes Of Sinope