The framers of the Constitution were all white, wealthy landowners who had no problem with the idea of human slavery, or various other forms of oppression. Women and white men who owned no property were excluded from what were supposed to be our “inalienable rights.” Voting and equal protections provided in The Constitution were given […]
I sat down to dinner recently with the family of one of my oldest and dearest friends. His sister came with her husband and their two young sons. Somehow the state of healthcare in America came up. The eldest son, speaking on behalf of his moron father – ex-Navy – stated emphatically that healthcare is […]
No one can be truly powerful unless he has access to the command of major institutions, for it is over these institutional means of power that the truly powerful are, in the first instance, truly powerful. -C. Wright Mills Author David Talbot makes a convincing case for the existence of an extremely powerful, utterly sociopathic […]
I read Friendly Fascism back in the early eighties, at the very start of the Reagan era. I decided to pick it up again recently to see how far we’ve come since then, and it’s amazing just how spot on author Bertram Gross was in his cogent analysis of elite power structures in America. Reading […]
Why is network news so awful? Because the main stream media [MSM] is no longer concerned with truth or unbiased journalistic integrity, that’s why. Those qualities have disappeared from contemporary broadcast media since Reagan abolished the Fairness Doctrine in 1987. According to the MSM, the only news worth covering is the campaign of Donald Trump. […]
Amending the Constitution is a difficult and complicated process. A two-thirds vote of approval in both Houses is required to formally propose an Amendment, which must then be ratified by ¾ of the States’ legislatures. The only other method of amending the Constitution requires that a national Constitutional Convention be called by Congress at the […]
The three structures under which most national governments interact with the general populace are the Unitary System: where all authority flows down from the central government to the local ‘branches’ of the central authority and can be abolished at any time. Examples of this form of government structure include Japan, France and the UK. The […]
The five steps of a domestic policy cycle are as follows. 1) Agenda building: this is done in many ways including lobbying, letter and email campaigns, phone calls and even protests, sit-ins, and strikes. 2) Formulation: where the policy is discussed, changes are suggested, hearings held. 3) Adoption: the policy is enacted into law, to […]
The concept of Checks and Balances is defined as a “confrontation of powers” in the Federalist Papers. It is the cornerstone of our Republican form of government. Under this structure, each of the three branches of government can “check” the actions of the other. It is a mechanism by which the government can act against […]
Judicial review is a key concept in policy making and in changing the meaning or intent of the Constitution. Although not specifically mentioned in the Constitution, it is implied throughout. Federalist Paper #78 discusses the need for Judicial Review and in it Publius stresses that the Judiciary is by far the weakest of the three […]
Jason Darensburg's Blog-o-rama 