Can there be 'good' laws?
POSTED BY: SignyM
UPDATED: Sunday, March 8, 2026 22:49
VIEWED: 1971
PAGE 2 of 3
Well, if laws are meant to control those in power, then *maybe* there can be good laws.
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More in depth , later , but I recommend a book by Judge Andrew Napolitano , " The Constitution In Exile ".
Kitty Werthmann.
'...Kitty was 12 years old when Adolf Hitler took over Austria.
She is 83 with a "vivid memory" of what happened in her homeland next. She witnessed the government take over the banks and the auto industry. Sound familiar? In the last nine months, Obama and the Democrats in Congress have successfully orchestrated the government takeover of Chrysler and General Motors along with countless banks.
She witnessed the "compulsory youth" service and indoctrination. That sounds a little like Obama's call for "mandatory volunteerism" for America's youth.
The government takeover of the schools immediately replaced crucifixes with pictures of Hitler and Nazi flags. "All religious instruction was replaced with physical education," said Werthmann. No prayer was allowed. That all happened here decades ago. It is interesting, however, that Obama's speech to the captive audience in the government schools – complete with the essay assignment about how students could help him achieve his political goals – was replaced once the American people got wind of it. And speaking of government control of education, if the Senate agrees, all student loans will be government issued, according to a bill that passed the House last week.
Werthmann saw what happened next when the government took over the health-care system. Her brother-in-law was a physician, and by the time he got to his office, 40 patients were already waiting in line. And if the medicine they needed wasn't on the "government-approved list," the cost came out of his own salary – "which dwindled down to almost nothing," Werthmann recalled. Sounds like H.R. 3200.
"All research stopped," and in the run-down medical facilities there was a "12-18 month wait for a hospital bed." That sounds like the warnings we've already gotten from Canada and elsewhere.
Are we headed for a Nazi-style totalitarian abyss? Find out in "Defeating the Totalitarian Lie: A Former Hitler Youth Warns America"
Werthman's husband saw what his brother faced and left Germany to practice medicine in the United States. Werthmann said, "He marveled at how modern our hospitals were, and how great our medical care is." That's the medical care Obama wants to replace with socialized medicine.
Kitty recalled the massive welfare system funded by 60-70 percent tax increases in an effort to "spread the wealth." Wow, there's an interesting phrase. Did I mention that "Joe the Plumber" will also be at the conference?
"The media was taken over by the government right away," Kitty recalls. "We got free radios and the radio stations were government-run. If you listened to a foreign radio station like the BBC, there was capital punishment," said Werthmann.
They had Joseph Goebbels; we have Mark Lloyd, the diversity czar, who is already poised to shut down private radio stations like his hero Hugo Chavez did – threatening licenses and waging outrageous fines on stations (up to $25 million dollars) who say things he doesn't like.
"We heard only what was on the radio," she said. "We couldn't get information from anywhere." Kind of like we'll be if the government takes over not only radio, but the Internet, as well. Senate bills 773 and 778, introduced by Sen. Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., would do just that – handing over control of one of our last bastions of free speech to none other than Barack Obama.
But now, Obama is poised to "bail out the newspaper industry," ushering in an official "state-run media." Sen. Ben Cardin, D-Md., has already introduced S. 673, the so-called "Newspaper Revitalization Act," providing the means. While most in the media already tow the official state line, Obama doesn't like those unruly blogs. It's a lot easier when you can silence people like Rep. Joe Wilson for speaking out against you – and then outlawing accurate words like "lie" from being said on the House floor.'
http://www.wn
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Sig, essentially yes.
It's like the death penalty. I don't believe in it for religious reasons, but for many people it's a moral dilemma:
They don't believe Charles Manson should live, but they don't want to hand the power to govt. as to who should live or who should die.
I hear this sort of thing from the left, and it makes sense to me, but I'd say the same concept applies in a broader sense.
But it's not just the enforcement, but the making of the laws. A small ruling elite makes laws for everyone. Communities should make their own rules, and if you don't like them, leave. If someone breaks the rules, twitter it, and others will respond. This is probably a better system than having a govt.
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Quote:
Originally posted by out2theblack:
More in depth , later , but I recommend a book by Judge Andrew Napolitano , " The Constitution In Exile ".
Why? Does he claim that people have tried to have him "banned"?
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Right, the rules are only so good as those writing and enforcing them - and even then mostly just keep honest people honest, legal guardrails, if you would.
I think cultural values set far stronger, and involve far more mutual consent that often arbitrary or even outright harmful laws handed down by a cabal only bent on their own power and glory.
That said, with ENOUGH consent behind them, laws can become cultural values - not beating your wife has certainly for the most part made the jump from on to the other, as an example.
Under Our Current Legal System which is a sham and a shellgame that's become a rigged scam over the past two hundred years - no, generally there's no "good" laws cause any law at all has so much OTHER shit stacked on the bill it ought not ever see the light of day...
It gets less horrific as it becomes more local, but anywhere you got politics, you got corruption, sure - from the oval office to your local PTA, it's gonna happen, especially in a system without strong checks against it, or (much of the middle east has this) a set of OTHER rules, culturally based, regarding bribery and chicanery, they got a word for it but I forget what it is cause I am badly distracted at the moment.
Laws, maybe not so much, possible but unlikely, we'll call it - cultural values and community ethics, usually more effective.
-F
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I concur with Frem being in accordance with me, article 54, subsection J
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Quote:
Originally posted by dreamtrove:
This isn't the issue. "Laws" are taken here as "powers given to the govt" as opposed to what we call "rules."
An orthodox jewish community has what it calls "laws" but they are only those set by the leaders of their community. If you fail to follow them, you're out.
The Govt. is a controlling elite. Giving it the power to *punish* people is a really bad idea, it creates power with either corrupts or is a magnet for the corrupt as Nietzsche suggests.
Our govt. was supposed to be a shell to prevent this kind of dictatorship, a shield against this kind of law, and punishment, but it created too much central power and not enough checks and balances, those that were created relied on the good will of humans, who were to be less and less trusted, since power is a magnet for the corrupt.
So I can't really answer the question without first addressing the issue of who has the power to make laws and enforce them. I suspect under the current system, no, nothing useful will come out of the govt.
Edit: I don't think that punishment has proven an effective means of detering crime. We have more serious crimes in our lawful communities than on our isolationist unruled communities (reservations, the amish, etc.) Though hunter gatherers in brazil have a fairly high murder rate.
Well I disagree completely and utterly. Firstly, there is significant evidence to indicate that laws impact on behaviour - a couple which come to mind are the impact that changes in divorce laws had on the number of people who got divorced (not that I'm advocating a return to the days of fault divorce) and secondly is the impact of drink driving laws on road deaths (here in Australia where we have random breath testing).
People need rules and consequences for breaking the rules, and they also need protection from people who might take advantage for them and they also need some system of justice when they've been wronged. These standards are pretty fundamental to society and exist everywhere.
I guess its just who does the rule making and punishing. You can have it community based, and there is some argument for putting a lot of stuff in the hands of the community to sort out for themselves, but ultimately you need some sort of cohesive and equitable system. I don't want to live somewhere where in the next suburb some extremist group controls law making and you get stoned for driving through when you are a woman.
either that, or you have mob rule, which I'm not too fond of either. One of the strengths of the justice system is it's dispassion, not distributing punishment based on some emotional zeal of the crowd.
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Quote:
Originally posted by out2theblack:
More in depth , later , but I recommend a book by Judge Andrew Napolitano , " The Constitution In Exile ".
Kitty Werthmann.
'...Kitty was 12 years old when Adolf Hitler took over Austria.
She is 83 with a "vivid memory" of what happened in her homeland next. She witnessed the government take over the banks and the auto industry. Sound familiar? In the last nine months, Obama and the Democrats in Congress have successfully orchestrated the government takeover of Chrysler and General Motors along with countless banks.
[snip]
dear oh dear. I wonder if it has ever occured to you that world and the history of the world consists of more than the US (yay) Nazi Germany (boo) Russian Communism (boo)
The fact is, Obama has been called everything from communist, fascist and (gasp) Muslim because he is proposing health care reforms - reforms which are frankly pitiful in nature - that would bring the US in line with ALL other western nations who have some form of public health care, and who don't all then send their citizens to the gulag and ban elections.
It will be even more of a shock to you that some places have a mix of nationalised and private industry, that the government might fund a tv station or other media outlets, they might even have some form of national service and still (gasp) the citizens are not being hoarded into cattle trucks.
And the reason is - they have laws - yes actual laws which ensure things like free speech, right to political association, limits to government powers, free elections, the right to legal representation and so on. All of which would not exist in the anarchists paradise, where survival of the fittest and nastiest would result - much like the conditions in pre war Germany, actually.
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Quote:
But then, it occurred to me: Our rights? They're granted to us by a series of LAWS. Because, after all, that's what the Constitution is: a series of laws which govern our government's behavior!
Actually, the use of the word inalienable in description of rights is not accurate. Rights are in this sense aren't intended to diminish the power of the government, but rather granted to individuals and recognized BY the government.
As an example, piss off a cop and see how quickly those rights get waived.
I disagree with Magonsdaughter, but I'll have to address that later.
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Hello,
I am in favor of laws that attempt to secure the maximum amount of personal freedom at the minimum cost to personal freedom.
Laws like "Don't murder people" or "Don't rape someone" are pretty straight forward exchanges. You lose your right to murder and rape people, but in exchange you are protected to a small degree from being murdered or raped yourself. This one can be tough if you live in a society of people who prize the right to rape and murder folks. In most societies, however, the overwhelming majority of citizens are not in pursuit of this personal freedom, and so the loss is small.
Laws like "No littering in public spaces" are similar. You lose your right to discard trash and garbage in non-approved receptacles, but gain the expectation of strolling through public spaces unmolested by rotting garbage and the resultant swarming flies.
Laws like, "You must wear clothes" seem excessive to me. I already have the freedom not to stare at naked people. But by incorporating this law into society, I lose the freedom to be naked myself. The exchange is inequitable. I lose something (clothing freedom) much more important than what I am gaining (Nothing. I can already avert my eyes from things that displease me.)
Each law has to be carefully studied on a case by case basis. Can we live without this law? Is there a way to change this law to hinder the least number of citizens? Can we implement a regular review process where we re-examine tha law and see if it can be minimized in some way?
The effort should be ever towards smaller law books with fewer laws in them. Every few years, the laws should be examined to determine which ones may qualify for elimination.
In my ideal society, a decent portion of the government coffer would be spent performing analyses of ways to reduce government and eliminate unnecessary laws. Congress would be hard at work for most of the year, getting very little time off. They would be constantly consumed, not by the implementation of new laws, but by the re-examination and elimination of existing laws.
--Anthony
"Liberty must not be purchased at the cost of Humanity." --Captain Robert Henner
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