Re: Republic vs. Democracy {was Re: OT More examples of generosity from President Obama
Ed Huntress
"Steve Ackman" <st...@SNIP-THIS.twoloonscoffee.com> wrote in message
news:slrnhq2h3v...@sorceror.wizard.dyndns.org...
> In <Zd7on.102692$Ye4....@newsfe11.iad>, on Wed, 17 Mar 2010 12:14:43
> -0500, William Wixon, wwi...@frontiernet.net wrote:
>
>> (all the right wingers are constantly irritatingly reminding everyone
>> whenever they say we live in a democracy "WE LIVE IN A REPUBLIC!!" as a
>> way
>> of reinforcing their right wing point of view. they don't like it when
>> the
>> other party is in charge.)
>
> I'm not a right winger, and I don't care which side of the
> Democratic-Republican coin happens to be up at the moment (they're both as
> evil as the other in their own ways), but...
>
> Nowhere in the Constitution does the word "democracy" or "democratic"
> appear. Guess which word actually *does* appear IN the CONSTITUTION. (*)
>
>
> ? James Madison: "Democracies have ever been spectacles of turbulence and
> contention; have ever been found incompatible with personal security, or
> the rights of property; and have, in general, been as short in their lives
> as they have been violent in their deaths" (1787).
>
> ? John Adams: "Remember, democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes,
> exhausts, and murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not
> commit suicide" (1814).
>
> ? Benjamin Franklin told Philadelphia's Mrs. Powell as he was walking out
> of the constitutional convention after they had pulled together the
> Constitution in 1787. She said, "What sort of nation has been conceived?"
> Ben Franklin replied, "It's a Republic, madam, if you can keep it".
> [He didn't say "Democracy" did he.]
>
> ? I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to
> the republic for which it stands...
>
>
> So, while this abomination of a government to which we find ourselves
> subject today resembles a democracy more than it ever did in times past,
> it is still, Constitutionally, a Republic.
>
> (*) The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a
> Republican Form of Government
>
My hands are shaking as I type this, but what do you mean by a "republic"?
<g>
--
Ed Huntress
William Wixon
"Steve Ackman" <st...@SNIP-THIS.twoloonscoffee.com> wrote in message
news:slrnhq2h3v...@sorceror.wizard.dyndns.org...
> In <Zd7on.102692$Ye4....@newsfe11.iad>, on Wed, 17 Mar 2010 12:14:43
> -0500, William Wixon, wwi...@frontiernet.net wrote:
>
>> (all the right wingers are constantly irritatingly reminding everyone
>> whenever they say we live in a democracy "WE LIVE IN A REPUBLIC!!" as a
>> way
>> of reinforcing their right wing point of view. they don't like it when
>> the
>> other party is in charge.)
>
> I'm not a right winger, and I don't care which side of the
> Democratic-Republican coin happens to be up at the moment (they're both as
> evil as the other in their own ways), but...
>
oy, here we go again.
i thought ed's comment in the original thread was hysterical.
"That's why we have a representative democracy rather than a direct
democracy."
lol.
b.w.
Ed Huntress
"William Wixon" <wwi...@frontiernet.net> wrote in message
news:Vleon.37112$mn6....@newsfe07.iad...
You probably didn't even see most of that thread. Retief the Troll and I
moved it to misc.survivalist.nutbags, to spare RCM the grief. <g>
--
Ed Huntress
Hawke
Now, don't go gettin' 'em started, Ed. It's a pandora's box. It reminds
me of a movie or TV show I saw where two people were arguing over the
words imply and infer. I can't remember what it was but it was like
Abbott and Costello with one yelling inferred and the other shouting
implied back and forth. They did this every time someone used one of the
words. Inferred!, no implied!, no inferred!, implied!. Kind of funny but
nobody's mind was ever changed. So now its republic!, democracy!, no
republic, no democracy!. Some things just aren't worth arguing about.
Hawke
wmbjk...@citlink.net
Reminds me of a recurring bit on Monkey Dust.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BKEBCG3iJtw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dj8ThOmPTuM
Wayne