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The US was founded by people who used violence against the government and made it a constitutional right to bear arms. If you had asked the founding fathers about the NSA, the crazy levels of nepotism and corruption and how self-centred the American elite is, they wouldn't have called shooting them terrorism. What level of incompetence and acting like the elite in Versailles is required for the constitutional right to fight back to take effect?
The US was founded by people who rebelled against an overseas government they considered illegitimate (albeit for quite selfish reasons of their own). They were not against the very concept of government and notwithstanding that Thomas Jefferson quote everyone likes so much, they were not advocating regular revolts and coups.
The founders would be aghast and agog about many things in today's world. However, one thing you can definitely say about them is that they anticipated and expected that the future would be very different from their own time and they knew they could not anticipate or dictate to future generations what government they would choose. They set down guidelines and checks and balances they hoped would stand the test of time, but even in their era there were cracks showing, and there was violent disagreement over the Constitution itself and the Bill of Rights.
There was also no shortage of nepotism and incompetence and self-centeredness among the elites, from the era of Virginia's dominance to Tammany Hall, and most certainly within the Confederacy.
The founders, if you took to the time to explain to them how institutions like the NSA came about, would eventually understand the concept of intelligence and national security, be concerned about privacy and individual rights, but would probably be a lot more upset about rise of federalism following the Civil War. (Though they would probably understand why and how the Civil War happened.)
Please put to rest this tired argument made by people like you and Kulak that "The Founding Fathers lived for violence and wanted regular bloodbaths, would be horrified that you have allowed (Thing I Don't Like), and cry from the grave for you to slaughter your political opponents." That is not who they were and it was not the world they sought.
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If you had explained that these were the product of a representative government, they might feel differently. The Founders were not of the opinion that one has the right never to lose an election.
The whole bit about violence against a government was about the fundamental lack of representation. That's what the DOI is all about. It's not an anarchist document that entitles anyone to pick up a gun because they don't like the NSA or the FTC or whatever else. Indeed, the DOI spends a lot of time explaining that very point.
The Anti-Federalists among the founders would not be particularly impressed, seeing as they insisted on that Bill of Rights.
Well, Aaron Burr was also a founder.
Well, yes, but the AF were largely outvoted at the Constitutional Convention.
Im also real sick of “the bill of rights mandates (whatever political platform I’m on today)”. When my side wins election, it’s a principle of democratic governance. When my side loses, it’s about minimum liberal rights. Even Scott succumbs to this in latest ACX.
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I am behind reinventing accountability for officials, functionaries, and politicians. Bring back competence while you're at it. The likelihood we bring back competence or accountability depends on what you mean by fighting back. If you mean random, indiscriminate killings of various public figures that increases in frequency over time I don't think this will end up constructive or constitutional. If you have some Washington-Cincinnatus figure in your back pocket to lead the cleansing fire of rebellion, then I say bring him forth let's just vote him in 3 or 4 times. It'll be easier.
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Here is the thing. The US is still, for all its flaws, democratic.
When people got fed up with the DC elites, they voted in Trump, who at least set a new baseline for corruption and nepotism.
If you have a good majority (say 60%) of the citizens behind you, then you do not need to shoot at the feds, you can simply elect one of your own as the next president.
If you do not have such a majority, then using violence to enforce your norms seems bad. I will give you a pass if your group is oppressed to the level of the Jews under the Nazis, but whatever the rules about trans people in gendered bathrooms your society has are, they are insufficient reason to start planting bombs.
If I endorsed a "constitutional right to fight back" for minority positions, then I would have to endorse proponents of mutually exclusive policy proposals to use violence to settle their difference, because saying that violence is only justified whenever I personally think that the advocated policy would be a good idea does not universalize.
Violence sucks very hard. It does not show who is right, only who is left. It can paralyze societies, and is a habit which is very hard to kick even after your side has won. The French and Russian revolution are both cautionary tales here. A democratic process, even as flawed as the US one (FPTP, EC, gerrymandering and so on) is much preferable to bombs and rifles.
Except I'd argue that the past decade and change serve to illustrate why that doesn't work, because the president isn't actually in charge of the Executive any more (see basically everything MacIntyre talks about here, or this from Jim). FBI JTTF goes after the "domestic terrorists" it wants to, not the ones the President directs them at — as we saw when Bush the younger tried to redirect them from chasing specters of the Klan to Muslim jihadis.
Our democracy is a sham. It's as fake as pro wrestling.
Funny, from where I stand, Trump is actually getting the executive to accomplish his goals. The national guard did occupy the cities he ordered occupied, and his ICE is busy deporting foreigners, just as his constituents wanted. His military is very willing to bomb Iran on his orders or blow up suspected drug smuggling ships.
Any bureaucracy created by a presidential edict can be destroyed by another. Any created by an act of congress can likewise be destroyed through an act of congress. Last time I checked, MAGA controlled both chambers of congress. He also has a supreme court which decided that he gets away with anything. If congress wanted to pass an act tomorrow which said that the EPA was shut down, all their guidelines void and all their employees fired, they could do that.
I mean, Trump is probably hampered by his lack of qualified personnel, with RFK just being an especially shocking case. But that is a skill issue.
I am not saying that the game is not rigged on some level. Most congress critter are likely beholden to some rich donors, and constrained with regard to what they can vote for without pissing them off. Likewise, the two-party system and party control over who gets the nomination make it hard for outsiders to win. And vast parts of the media landscape are in the hands of a few very rich people who use it to push views which are in their interests.
But the game is always going to be a bit rigged in favor of the status quo. This is why I said you might need 60% instead of merely 51%. Also, to the degree that liberal deep-state DC elites are a thing, they certainly did not prevent Trump getting elected, twice. And the media landscape is actually a lot more diverse than it ever was before the internet.
This is certainly a minority view. Now, you can of course claim that most people have been brainwashed, and if they saw reality as clearly as you do they would support the destruction of the system. In some countries, e.g. Russia, I think you would be right. But US citizens have all sorts of news sources at their fingertip, if they listen to ${EVIL_PROPAGANDA_MEDIUM}, that is by choice and not by coercion.
RFK specifically is in his job as coalition politics, rather than because Trump can't find anyone else.
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Note that most of your comments on Trump actually getting the executive branch to do what he wants are part of the Trump 2 administration, not Trump 1 when overt and covert acts of deviance were regularly reported. Trump 2, in turn, has been an administration with exceptional deliberate pre-planning on how to try and make politically unpopular changes over the objection / resistance over the minority party, particularly with the atypical advantage of a governing trifecta, and has been accompanied by explicit denunciations for Trump installing loyalists and opposing 'independent' agencies.
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It's simple. If the person fighting back is part of the in-group, they are based and understandable, if maybe a bit over the top.
If they're in the out group... They are horrible borderline terrorist individuals who are wholly representative of the entire out group, justifying why the out group sucks and must be crushed into impotence.
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