Equality, fairness, justice not in conservative vocabulary

you communist low life piece of un american sh . Why dont you just leave the country.

No one argues that the Constitution is sovereign. Quite the contrary, the express purpose of the Constitution is to PROTECT the sovereignty of the American people, which you concede exists.

The problem with your assessment is that in the context of the Founders and in the theoretical arena by which "sovereignty" is assigned, the People are viewed as individuals EACH retaining sovereign rights and NOT under any circumstances, collectively. So, if, as you correctly state, the American people are sovereign, then a Welfare state that is not embodied SOLELY by individual voluntary contribution and is instead maintained via taxation and the coercive power of government is a direct violation of that sovereignty.

You, or others like you, may choose to gather together and set up whatever system you like based upon your own shared concepts of "equality, fairness and justice" - concepts which are embraced by essentially everyon but NOT as modern liberals would describe them - in a free society. You CANNOT impose regulations on others (the notion that the market is "well" regulated is a joke) or your own personal definition of those concepts without explicitly violating that sovereignty.

Why anyone would advocate something (the Welfare state) which undeniably - by anyone with a grasp of the facts - INCREASES poverty, strangles economic growth, reduces opportunity and harms the very people it is ostensibly designed to help remains entirely beyond me.

As a former Coloradan, I am ashamed of how the once great state of Colorado has gone down the tubes in just ten years.

Now, to the point: "Equality, fairness, justice not in conservative vocabulary". You could not be more wrong!!! Conservatives believe in equality of opportunity, not outcome; that's self-explanatory and needs no additional comment. Conservatives believe in Fairness that is applied with blind objectivity, not variable application depending on differing circumstances; we consider that an abuse, whether in the court of law, the lending of money for homes or businesses or any other situation where "fairness" has a sliding scale. That is NOT fairness. Conservatives believe the same thing about Justice as we do Fairness.

I hope I have explained to you just why you are so wrong in this and, I suspect, in many, many more matters.

I hope some day you grow up and become a real American.

KaeSea, you've been taught the principle of equality of opportunity and not equality of outcomes. You should understand that someone in a place like the Heritage Foundation MADE THIS UP one day. It's simple and catchy and you can regurgitate this sophistry without thinking twice about it. I've commented on the history of this sophistry in other places and you may be able to find them.

The thing I'd like you to see now is that underlying all your statements is some unstated assumptions about "who does this and how do they do it and for whom do they do it?" When you speak about "Fairness being applied with blind objectivity," you should realize that you have postulated that certain people are applying this fairness either to, for or on behalf of another set of people and you need to ask yourself whether you trust those who are applying this fairness to really have your own welfare in mind rather than their own. Thomas Sowell acknowledges this flaw in free-market theory on page 113 of "Visions."

If a welfare state is "fair', then for whom is it fair? Is it fair that the teenage girl who DECIDED to sleep around before getting married (or not use birth control) gets free money from the government, while my income is taxed? My husband works hard to provide for us, yet he gets money confiscated to pay for the irresponsible actions of others. I CHOSE to not have babies until I was married to a good man. So I never needed welfare.

The welfare state, while perhaps a nice idea, is not fair to the productive and responsible who make wise choices. It rewards those who choose NOT to do well in school and NOT work and sacrifice like the rest of us.

My husband and I VOLUNTARILY give over ten per cent of our income to charity. We do it happily because nobody forces us, under threat of jail, to do so.