Unforseen Consequences?

The United States Constitution is flawed. There is little, if any, debate on that point. The framers and the founders knew their new nations guiding document would need to be revised and refined as time went by, and they put in place mechanisms to do just that.

The greatest aspect of that august document however is that it set in place a detailed, well reasoned and well thought out series of processes for the act of self governance that have successfully guided this nation for over two hundred and twenty years.

Those acts of intelligent foresight are under assault and with it the foundations of American democracy.

The rhetoric of shrill shrieking nonsense that now encapsulates the discourse of the body politic shows that the fundamental intellectual principles of the Constitution are being blatantly ignored at the cost of the freedoms we were given by our founding fathers. While imperfect, the reasoning for constructing the Constitution as it is shows that the principle of unforeseen circumstances has always been at the forefront of addressing its imperfections. Save Prohibition, there have been no hasty, capricious changes during the aforementioned two hundred and twenrty years.

Three events this week have shown just how ignorant and sadly outright stupid our elected officials have been in ignoring the rule of unforeseen consequences in forming particular policies that perhaps seemed correct at the time but with a minimal amount of thought would never have been accepted and implemented.

To wit:

Under the guise of cleaning money out of the electoral process, the theory of public financing of the process has become somewhat in vogue, but consider this stark reality:

The Republican and Democratic parties have each received nearly $18 million in taxpayer money for next year's political conventions and could receive another infusion of cash by early next year. 

The sums were reported this week by the Federal Election Commission and show how public financing for presidential elections has grown over the years -- though the political parties also raise copious private money for the conventions.  A basic understanding of the corrupting influence of cash in politics could have, and should now avoid this nonsense.

The Secret Service is entrusted with protecting our leaders, amongst its other duties and responsibilities. There is no realisitc argument to be made for denying these leaders such safeguards and security oprotections, but consider this by product of that thought process:

Vice President Joseph R. Biden, acting now as the landlord, can count on at least 12 more months of rental income from the agency that protects his life.

Federal spending records show the U.S. Secret Service approved a purchase order on Nov. 2 to pay Mr. Biden $26,400 for agents to stay at a cottage on lakefront property he owns in Delaware.

Edwin M. Donovan, special agent in charge at the Secret Service's Office of Public Affairs in Washington, said Mr. Biden isn’t receiving all that money at once. Instead, he said, the purchase order shows plans by the Secret Service to pay Mr. Biden $2,200 per month for another year. Was this considered in the framing of protecting our leadership, and who can condone this practice?

The right of free assembly and the right to protest government policies is in many way a uniquely American concept. No argument can be made to quell that right, and none should ever be offered. The “Occupy Wall Street’ protests taking place across the nation are an example of the citizenry looking for a redress of their grievances, but sadly our elected officials are choosing impotence to enforce the rules and regulations for such protests for fear of political backlash. But consider this example, symbolic of hundreds of similar situations occurring concurrently to the protests, which amongst their issues is the rising unemployment rate:

A New York City cafe cut its staff by nearly 25 percent last week because of lost business due to the ongoing

Occupy Wall Street

protests.

Marc Epstein, owner of the Milk Street Cafe at 40 Wall Street in lower Manhattan, said he had to cut 21 of the 97 members of his staff on Thursday and Friday after seeing sales plummet by 30 percent in the six weeks since the protests began. He's also been forced to slash the restaurant operating hours, moving up his closing time from 9 p.m. to 3:30 p.m. Mondays through Thursdays.

While these are only examples, the underlyinmg fact is inescapable; either we take the time to follow the processes laid out within the text of the Constitution and properly deliberate governmental policies, no matter the scope or scale, and regardless of the level of government, or these examples will become the norm.

That eventuality would signal the Visigoths coming over the hills of Rome, thus ending America as the founders intended.