J.D. Tuccille Talks War, Syria and the Limits of Presidential Authority

Yesterday I joined the YoAndrew News Talk Show to discuss the march toward war with Syria, as well as the example set by the British parliament in actually voting on (and against) military action, and President Obama's subsequent agreement to wait for Congress to act before moving forward with hostitlities. Will the president hold off if U.S. lawmakers follow the example of their counterparts in the U.K.? That's what I want to know, and it's part of what we discussed.

Click here to listen (it's about 17 minutes total).

Why, yes. The show is based in New York.

Comments

[Paul.]

the Limits of Presidential Authority

Huh?

[Pro Libertate]

Limits? We don't need no stinking limits.

[sarcasmic]

"Llllli. Lllllimi. Llimi. Liiiimit. Uh. Llllll. Llllllimit. Limit. OK. I don't understand."
/anyone with government authority

[Pro Libertate]

The Founders really fucked up not mandating shock collars for all government officials.

[sarcasmic]

The Founders really fucked up when they thought the different branches of government would check each others power.

[Episiarch]

The Founders really fucked up when they thought we would have a tyranny-clearing revolution every forty years or so.

[Loki]

In their defense, at the time we were a young frontier republic. I think it's safe to assume that people living rough and tumble on a frontier are going to be far less tolerant of busybodies and general government dickery than people who are prosperous and well off compared to the rest of the world. IOW, people have a lot more to lose now than they did 200 years ago. That and "sheeple".

[sarcasmic]

"Nip the shoots of arbitrary power in the bud, is the only maxim which can ever preserve the liberties of any people. When the people give way, their deceivers, betrayers, and destroyers press upon them so fast, that there is no resisting afterwards. The nature of the encroachment upon the American constitution is such, as to grow every day more and more encroaching. Like a cancer, it eats faster and faster every hour. The revenue creates pensioners, and the pensioners urge for more revenue. The people grow less steady, spirited, and virtuous, the seekers more numerous and more corrupt, and every day increases the circles of their dependents and expectants, until virtue, integrity, public spirit, simplicity, and frugality, become the objects of ridicule and scorn, and vanity, luxury, foppery, selfishness, meanness, and downright venality swallow up the whole society. "
-- John Adams, Novanglus Letters, 1774

[db]

Sounds like Part III of Atlas Shrugged.

[Pro Libertate]

You've failed them yet again.

[Brett L]

In fairness, I think they simply failed to imagine a world where the entire Eastern seabord, much less the entire vast continent, could be controlled by any sized force.

[db]

This. The idea that several hundred million people can be herded into a monolithic culture and forced to play along with the idea that they are somehow "self-governing" is newer than the founding of our Republic.

"The Long Tail" of consumer choice is only the beginning. With anything more than truly libertarian, laissez faire, minimalist governmental rules, the idea that any set of rules can be made to be best for so many people and geographical/cultural differences is crazy.

It should be obvious that all that tighter controls on society accomplish is more disgruntled minorities that feel they don't truly have representation. Our leaders see this, through filters, and can only offer things like war as grand motivating projects to manufacture large-scale feelings of community.

When the only thing holding a society together is hatred for something else, it is doomed.

[Anonymous Coward]

That's why our central planning masters need CHOO-CHOOS and stack n' pack housing. Once the plebes are all reduced to the same standard of living, then they'll fall in line with the same laws and regulations.

Of course, the philosopher-kings and Warrior Caste will enjoy certain greater privileges in accordance with their status.

[Loki]

The Founders really fucked up not mandating shock collars for all government officials.

Shock collars probably wouldn't do it. They should have mandated 2 weeks in Warty's rape dungeon for every "yes" vote on their voting record for congresscritters, and 2 months for every bill signed into law for presidents. SCOTUS justices get a year everytime they decide a case in favor of the government. And career bureacrats get a year in the dungeon for every year of governemnt "service"

That way they'd really have to think about whether or not we really need whatever law they're thinking about passing/ signing/ upholding/ etc.

[db]

Why, yes. The show is based in New York.

New York City, where all them hoity-toity interior decorators live?

[Brett L]

It's where fake salsa comes from...

**Glares squinty-eyed at Pace for being bought by a NY company**

Git a rope.

[Snark Plissken]

New Jersey actually.

[Hyperion]

Pace? Yep, definitely fake, tastes like ketchup.

[Brett L]

I don't mind the picante style as long as it is Hot. Mild and medium are like chunky ketchup. But it is easy to find better stuff at Publix.

[Hyperion]

I don't like any salsa much that's been cooked, and especially if it has sugar in it, yech!

[Brett L]

But you have to wait for fresh salsa to get the taste of salsa and not all the separate ingredients!

[Hyperion]

I typically make a half gallon and put it in the fridge overnight, and it's great by the next day. I chop mine pretty fine too, so that probably helps.

[Snark Plissken]

I don't mind cooked salsa and Pace is pretty good, just take away the sugar. I say this as someone who was born in NM.

I make my own version of Pace here in Prague since I can't make fresh salsa here. But I can get canned jalapenos and cilantro fairly easily these days. I also throw in some Hatch red chili powder that my mommy sends me.

[Paul.]

I think someone is trying to digitally 'out' me. I'm getting a bunch of gay dating ads in the sidebar on this column. Anyone else?

[Hyperion]

All I see is T-Shirt ads with girls in tight tees.

Must be you dude, the adware bot knows it's audience...

[Brett L]

Stop googling for gay porn. Reason uses google adsense, I think.

[Hyperion]

Err, I think you just replied to the wrong person. I only see girls in Tee-shirts, nothing gay about that.

Whoa, now I see a backpack add, adsense must think I'm a terrorist! Why would anyone need a backpack?

[Brett L]

Mine thinks I'm a hipster. Its all camera and "be a sound tech" ads. And yeah, I did reply to the wrong person.

[db]

Until you get ads for mustache wax and ukelele lessons on the same page you're not a hipster.

[Brett L]

Speaking of mustache wax, I saw some dude at the OB's with his apparently pregnant female companion. I didn't know they were allowed to breed!

[db]

I nearly bought a tin of mustache wax last fall at the Knob Creek Machinegun Shoot. The guy selling it was rocking a great 1890s handlebar. I was in awe and really wanted to try it. I would go more for a 2112-era Neil Peart, though.

[sarcasmic]

firefox + addblocker = ha ha!

[neoteny]

a bunch of gay dating ads

Aren't you mistaking the Fixing the World: Reason Seminar Cruise ad?

[Paul.]

Strangely, after I posted the comment and the page refreshed, it went back to "MALE GAMERS ONLY" wartune ad. Basically, (as best I can tell) an MMORPG for desperate young men who don't date much and can't get laid. Now it knows its audience.

[Anonymous Coward]

Adware knows your secrets. It sees into your soul. It knows what faces your demons wear.

Adware knows what you fear most in this world.

[db]

If co-opted by an Orwellian torture ministry, imagine what evil Dware could enable.

[Snark Plissken]

All I get is sweet, sweet AdBlock Plus.

[Hyperion]

Syria Senate resolution full of loop holes, might allow boots on the ground

Yeah, but, we aren't talking about Bushitler here, heh, this is Obama and he just said 'Let me be clear, we aren't talking about boots on the ground'. And everyone knows this President would never use any kind of loopholes, and he's never lied about anything before, ever.

Amirite? Nothing to fear here, we should support this, because Obama, not Bushitler.

[Somalian Road Corporation]

Romney makes comment about "binders full of women" = literal weeks of nonstop snark

Obama caught in repeated baldfaced lies including "there is no spying on Americans" = crickets

[db]

Don't worry, I hear Jon Stewart's been working hard all summer to find the perfect clips juxtaposing Obama's statements pro- and anti-war. Also, to catalogue all his verbal gaffes and present them as mercilessly as he did Bush's.

[Loki]

BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!11!!!1!!!!

Good one...

[Loki]

B-b-but... RETHUGLICAN WAR ON WOMYNZ!!!11!!!!eleventybillion!!!11!!

And besides, Chocolate Nixon is teh awesome. And last but not least:

RACIST!!111!!!