our foolish founding fathers left us NO provision for removing tyrants

[mopaul]

what morons they were, now thanks to their lack of forethought, we are stuck with bush and the nazis and there's not a damned thing we can do about it.

dumbass founding fathers, i guess they never figured on the bush vampire family.

[fasttense]

1. They never thought the people would be dumb enough

to allow one draconian political party to take control of all three branches of government.

[lvx35]

2. Sure they did

they gave us the second ammendmant. Now all we have to do is take our well ordered militias and...wait...uh oh! ;)

[Raksha]

3. Maybe we could amend the Constitution to allow for a recall.

I mean AFTER we get a hack-proof election system, of course.

[XemaSab]

4. Yeah they did

It's right there in between freedom of speech and the right not to have soldiers quartered in your house.

:hide:

[Theduckno2]

5. They were dreamers.

They probably hoped that citizens, when given the power to decide their nation's fate, would dutifully come to grips with the important issues of state, seek out those candidates that would be most suitable to deal with those issues, and then VOTE!

I don't think they anticipated such ignorant apathy in such a large part of the electorate.

I'm sorry, I'm preaching to the choir.

edit: punc.

[Frank Cannon]

6. They had just gone through all this shit with another King George

They probably never imagined that Americans would WILLFULLY let it happen again.

[Hubert Flottz]

7. I was thinking the same thing.

Our checks and balances have bounced!

[WePurrsevere]

8. To remove a true tyrant we have the same provision they did. It's called..

a Revolution. :patriot:

IF the system of government truly and totally breaks down Jefferson thought it was healthy to have one now and then, “Every generation needs a new revolution.”

Kennedy predicted, "A revolution is coming - a revolution which will be peaceful if we are wise enough; compassionate if we care enough; successful if we are fortunate enough - but a revolution which is coming whether we will it or not. We can affect its character, we cannot alter its inevitability." He may have meant what happened in the 60's but it's timeless and possibly applicable in the near future... time will tell.

It would have been easier if the founding fathers had built in more "protections" but because of where they were coming from and their beliefs about government I wonder if they didn't so we would not become to apathetic and have to fight for our rights now and then. (There's a quote I'm trying to pull from the old memory bank that reflects this but whether it's my cold or lack of coffee it's just not uploading ::sigh:: )

Personally I'm not fully convinced that our system is totally broken yet. It may be in danger but I still hold on to hope that we can effect the changes needed through peaceful means and will continue to "fight" (and pray) in that direction.

[Lindsay]

9. They didn't anticipate corporate-owned

hijackable voting machines or corporate-owned mass media. The Bush vampire family (good one!) had a great deal of help.

[KharmaTrain]

10. How About That Coveted Second Ammendment?

According to the survivalists, the right to own firearms up the wazoo was supposed to be the ultimate safeguard in preventing a tyrant from "destroying our freedoms". I can still see the smug Repugnican face I used to debate this topic with and that was his stock answer. Of course he'd never hit on my follow up which was "how about if one of those tyrants is one of us???". He always assumed it's be some guy named Ivan or Abdul or Wang Chung.

Now with this regime hellbent on destroying the very civil liberties the libertarians and other "strict constitutionalists" and second ammendment nuts have fought for, what will or can they do? The NRA is conflicted like crazy right now (why else would Craig vote WITH Feingold???) and it might be interesting to see how this group separates it's support for this regime for their love of either guns or the constitution.

[zanne]

16. They're not afraid of "Ivan" or "Abdul"....

They're afraid of Hillary and if she ever sits in the oval office as president, they'll be screaming to revoke the Patriot Act and every last morsel of Executive Power. The idea of having Democrats listening in on their overseas phone calls is unbearable to them. I don't think we use this enough in our political "discussions" with freepers.

[KharmaTrain]

18. Now We Know What All Those FBI Files Are All About

Using Freeper "logic", Hillary must have been looking for Al Queda...that's why she needed those FBI files. Ya know they had tried to blow up the WTC in '93 hadn't they? Of course the wingnuts now will be glad Hillary had all those files...she might have found a sleeper cell...

:sarcasm:

May these people be forever tormented by their fear of the Clennis!

[mcscajun]

11. They left us one provision, one tool, and one blueprint

The first two are in the Constitution; the last in the Declaration of Independence:

Article II, Section 4:
The President, Vice President and all civil Officers of the United States, shall be removed from Office on Impeachment for, and Conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors.

Amendment II:
A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.


"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security."

They weren't morons, and they had a good grasp on human nature, too. (See the second highlight above.) It is our own shame that most in this country have long forgotten most of the quote above; most know the first sentence by heart, and many the first clause of the second, but nearly all have lost sight of what follows.

If we do not use what they provided, more shame to us.

[MercutioATC]

12. Actually, I think they showed some wisdom...

I think the founding fathers wisely made it difficult to remove a President. They realized that any leader will have to make decisions that are unpopular at times and, I believe, saw the danger of frequently replacing leaders based on popular whim.

They gave us the Articles of Impeachment to deal with situations like this. It's not a quick remedy by DESIGN.

[TheGunslinger]

13. Read the Declaration of Independence. It's in there

but involves a bit of violence. ;)

[flordehinojos]

14. didn't they leave us with a least two tools?

1) impeachment and 2) revolutionary action?

and, is bush, given his, and poppy's, SOCIOPATHIC NATURE, forcing the rest of us into revolutionary action--either by peaceful means or bloody ones?

[cantstandbush]

19. Revolutinary action was not left to us. It is an historical measure open

to all people at any time for any reason.

[zippy890]

15. so what should happen, mopaul?

your doing a lot of FFT (founding-father-trashing) lately, so what should we do?

Having grown up in Western Massachusetts, I think some local history might be instructive.

The Shays Rebellion was an armed uprising in Western Massachusetts, United States, that lasted from 1786 to 1787. Many of the rebels, known as Shaysites or Regulators, were small farmers angered by high debt and tax burdens. The rebellion started on August 29, 1786. Rebellion was led by Daniel Shays, a war veteran.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shays'_Rebellion

The farmers sought justice, but they were defeated. Daniel Shays lost it all: his rebellion, his freedom- and later died in poverty. Yet his revolt awakened people, including some of the founding elites, to the hypocrisy in their democracy, eventually leading to more rights and an extension of voting to citizen's like Shays..

'Indeed it was Shay's uprising and others like it at the time that prompted Jefferson to write to a friend: "I hold it that a little rebellion now and then is a good thing....God forbid that we should ever be twenty years without such a rebellion"

(excerpts from 'Rebellion is What Built America' by Jim Hightower)

Maybe our founders weren't such dumbasses, perhaps just naive. They expected the citizenry to shake things up now and again, perhaps they wanted us to battle the inevitable bastards that would rise to power, on a more regular basis than we've been doing.

Whatchya say mopaul? ready to join up for little kick-ass rebellion like ole Tom Jefferson said?

then there's the Green Mountain Boys of Vermont
http://www.ethanallenhomestead.org/HISTORY/greenmountainboys.htm

Now I'm not advocating anything violent myself here, just pointing out some history. American history.

[radwriter0555]

17. Hey, a revolution worked very well the last time.

:)