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In Philadelphia This Morning, Obama to Call for "A New Declaration of Independence"

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posted on Jan, 18 2009 @ 07:42 PM
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Hey Red you ask where to start, My answer, Alaska



posted on Jan, 18 2009 @ 08:00 PM
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Alaska eh?

They are in a perfect situation to simply secede if they chose to.

Please elaborate on why we should start there.



posted on Jan, 18 2009 @ 08:45 PM
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Originally posted by Stormdancer777



The last act of a failed regime is always to loot the treasury on the way out the back door.


Exactly, words fail me as they often do.



So your saying the Obama will just start out by looting it before anyone notices what a tard he is?



posted on Jan, 18 2009 @ 08:59 PM
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Originally posted by Benevolent Heretic

Originally posted by Stormdancer777
US Constitution “reflected the fundamental flaw of this country, that continues to this day”

What does he mean exactly?


Again, CONTEXT is critical in determining what a person means.
Please listen to the entire quote.



Like a true politician he is still very unclear in what he means exactly. The interviewer let him off easy. Probably becouse shes stupid.

I wish Buckley were still alive. Lets this fast talker set down to an interview with a mind like that rather than these sounding boards.

IMO the thing isn't flawed were he suggest. Its the lack of willingness to extend the virtues of the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, ect. It was the constitution that helped blacks pull themselves up and gave them moral ground to demand.

Hes a good talker if your IQ is below 100.



posted on Jan, 18 2009 @ 09:07 PM
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reply to post by Little Star
 


On Speech.

This is just slightly above mindless drivel. Pure rhetoric. Feel good, touch bases, mouth emotive quips, baloney.



posted on Jan, 18 2009 @ 09:16 PM
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reply to post by Little Star
 


Please go back and read the original article. It very clearly says that Obama is going to imitate Lincoln and suggest a "new DoI"

Since the article came off the wires, then it is a sure bet that the tagline came from the Obama team.



posted on Jan, 18 2009 @ 09:22 PM
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Logarock, Why so bitter? The speech was wonderful. It was short and concise and clearly laid out a framework from which he shall begin his Presidency. It was clear that he intends to undo the damage that was done to erode our freedoms and that allowed the financial sector to act in a manner that destroyed our economy. That was the whole point of bringing the Declaration of Indepence into the speech. This is what he wants to declare independence from, that and foreign oil.

To the poster that copied the taped the interview into the thread again. No, the only way anyone could think that he was vague is if they are looking to add something into what he said that he did not say. He was pretty clear. He was talking about the thinking that allowed slavery to continue, the view of Black human beings as chattel. He was very specific about this. He then said that similar thinking exists today. That which exists to day is called bigotry.

So, if you missed his point it is more than likely that the problem lies in you and your willingness to find something to gripe about. Now, if you think that a government that purports to establish freedoms which allow its elite (and they were the elite that you guys say you hate so much) to establish their own govenment to govern their business activiities and ability to live free of the control of an absent ruler, can find it in their minds and hearts to justify millions of humans to remain in bondage and to be traded like cattle, is not flawed thinking, then perhaps you agree with those that think in that manner.

It is like your neighbor coming over to your house, taking your kid, and then protesting it isn't fair or right when someone comes and takes his own. The Constitution was clearly written with the flawed thinking and moral judgnent of the time. Even people that weren't raised in this country recognize this. I am sure you had years of US history where you had an opportunity to garner this understanding. If not, perhaps you do now.



[edit on 18-1-2009 by Little Star]

[edit on 18-1-2009 by Little Star]



posted on Jan, 18 2009 @ 09:29 PM
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reply to post by Anonymous ATS
 

If people voted for him purely based on race, then he would have never won. Unless, of course, you think some whites voted for his white half.



posted on Jan, 18 2009 @ 09:31 PM
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reply to post by lunarminer
 
Taglines are written by the news agency or paper that runs the story, not a politician's transition team. Do you really think they have the time for that type of thing right now?



posted on Jan, 18 2009 @ 09:35 PM
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reply to post by Logarock
 

Also, how did the Constitution help blacks? You clearly have not read it. Read it then come back and talk about it.



posted on Jan, 18 2009 @ 09:36 PM
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reply to post by Ex_MislTech
 


"Obama isn't talking about literally writing a new Declaration of Independence. He is using it as a figure of speech, and I can't believe that it went over so many heads here.

I resent it when any politician starts throwing around meaningfull terms, like "Bill of Rights, Constitution, and Declaration of Independence" to score cheap points in a speach.

Our founding documents have real meaning and value to many of us, and it cheapens them to use them is the way that Obama has.
I was offended when the Congress used the term "Patient's Bill of Rights" and "Passenger's Bill of Rights" to describe bills before Congress. As if our "Rights" could be mandated or doled out by Congress.

As the Declaration of Independence states, our Rights come from our Creator. They are ours, regardless of what a King, President, or Congress, may mandate.

So, now comes Obama and he says that we need a new Declaration of Independence, yadda, yadda, yadda, blah, blah, blah.

How about we follow the precepts of the original?



posted on Jan, 18 2009 @ 09:42 PM
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reply to post by Little Star
 



You said, "How did the Costitution help blacks..."

I suggest that you go back and study some more history. It was the US Constitution that was quoted in numerous Supreme Court Decisions that upheld the Civil Rights Movement. How did that help blacks? Indeed.



posted on Jan, 18 2009 @ 09:49 PM
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reply to post by redhatty
 


i applaud you and all our veterans- even if it wasn't upholding our constitition you did your duty. period. i had a few friends in the gulf war- 1 was killed- others unharmed but they were fighting whether they wanted to or not. that IS what they get paid for. my grandfather won the bronze star in ww2 in the 82nd airborne-god i wish he would have talked about it - i respect any person who will fight for my rights. hopefully if the sthf i hook up with people like you- i'll die before i give away my rights and the constitution that was written to give us our rights
about time for another boston tea party



posted on Jan, 18 2009 @ 09:52 PM
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Some of the things said here are really astounding. The Supreme Court cases which quoted the Constitution as grounds to help Blacks gain freedom from Jim Crow laws, were written long after the Constitution was written. Obama was specifically speaking regarding the thinking at the time it was written. The entire discussion in that thread, and what the original poster claimed was vague, was regarding Obama's statement that the thinking at the time the Constitution was written was flawed and those flaws were written into the Constitution and indeed they were very literally written into the Consitution. Here is a short discussion I found on the topic which also quotes directly from the Constitution and its provisions regarding slavery.

Despite the freedoms demanded in the Declaration and the freedoms reserved in the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, slavery was not only tolerated in the Constitution, but it was codified.

The Constitution has often been called a living tribute to the art of compromise. In the slavery question, this can be seen most clearly. The Convention had representatives from every corner of the United States, including, of course, the South, where slavery was most pronounced. Slavery, in fact, was the backbone of the primary industry of the South, and it was accepted as a given that agriculture in the South without slave labor was not possible. Though slaves were not cheap by any measure, they were cheaper than hiring someone to do the same work. The cultivation of rice, cotton, and tobacco required slaves to work the fields from dawn to dusk. If the nation did not guarantee the continuation of slavery to the South, it was questioned whether they would form their own nation.

Slavery is seen in the Constitution in a few key places. The first is in the Enumeration Clause, where representatives are apportioned. Each state is given a number of representatives based on its population - in that population, slaves, called "other persons," are counted as three-fifths of a whole person. This compromise was hard-fought, with Northerners wishing that slaves, legally property, but uncounted, much as mules and horses are uncounted. Southerners, however, well aware of the high proportion of slaves to the total population in their states, wanted them counted as whole persons despite their legal status. The three-fifths number was a ratio used by the Congress in contemporary legislation and was agreed upon with little debate.

In Article 1, Section 9, Congress is limited, expressly, from prohibiting the "Importation" of slaves, before 1808. The slave trade was a bone of contention for many, with some who supported slavery abhorring the slave trade. The 1808 date, a compromise of 20 years, allowed the slave trade to continue, but placed a date-certain on its survival. Congress eventually passed a law outlawing the slave trade that became effective on January 1, 1808.

The Fugitive Slave Clause is the last mention. In it, a problem that slave states had with extradition of escaped slaves was resolved. The laws of one state, the clause says, cannot excuse a person from "Service or Labour" in another state. The clause expressly requires that the state in which an escapee is found deliver the slave to the state he escaped from "on Claim of the Party."

Here is a link to the site where it was published:

www.usconstitution.net...

So, indeed, the original Constitution supports the evil of slavery.



posted on Jan, 18 2009 @ 10:06 PM
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reply to post by lunarminer
 


Why is it that so many Americans do not understand or know the history of their own country? The Declaration of Independence has nothing to do with our rights as citizens of the United States. Nothing, not a thing whatsoever. It is declaring independence from England. It was directed towards the King of England. It does not lay out the rights of the citizens of the this country. The United States did not exist at the time it was written. So, how could it possibly lay out the rights of its citizens? Obama used it in his speech to say we as a nation need to draft a new independence from the conditions that now exist within our union, our country that are unfair and unjust just as those conditions which existed at the time of the Declaration of Independence. We, as citizens, need to look back at the will and courage they displayed and create a government that treats its citizens with the justice and dignity they deserve just as those men did in their time.

[edit on 18-1-2009 by Little Star]

[edit on 18-1-2009 by Little Star]



posted on Jan, 18 2009 @ 10:11 PM
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reply to post by Little Star
 


Which of the flaws in the Constitution that you mentioned, have not been redressed?

Obama says that the flaws continue to this day. What is he talking about?

Some of his statements kinda smack of 40 acres and a mule stuff.



posted on Jan, 18 2009 @ 10:17 PM
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reply to post by Little Star
 


So, the line about "certain unalienable rights" was simply refering to the conditions that existed between the Colonists and England?

That's kinda funny because it was the "unalienable rights" issue that caused the writting of the "Bill of Rights". The founders wanted to nail that down a bit.

I would also point out that the consent of the governed being extended to the government is the very foundation of our Republic and cannot be separated from the DoI.



posted on Jan, 18 2009 @ 10:17 PM
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No he said that similar flawed thinking exists today.



posted on Jan, 18 2009 @ 10:32 PM
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reply to post by Little Star
 


I went back and listened to the clip again. Nowhere in it does Obama say that the "thinking was flawed". He very clearly says that the Constitution is flawed and that those flaws "continue to this day". He is refering to the document.

I am a little worried when a "Constitutional Scholar" as Obama is supposed to be, starts saying the the document is flawed and that those flaws continue to this day. Which part is he refering to? Is he in fact refering to the entire document as he seems to be?

I have heard many times over the years from persons on the Left that the Constitution is out moded and needs to be replaced. One of the things that they often refer to as being outmoded is the amendments process. Some would like amending the Constitution to be as easy as passing any other type of bill. I think that would be a disaster.



posted on Jan, 18 2009 @ 10:33 PM
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reply to post by lunarminer
 


Okay, here are parts of the document that point out that it was addressing British rule and not establishing rights to be given to the citizens of a country. Also, a big clue is that the fact that Constitution was not codified until 1787, after the conclusion of the Revolutionary War. The DOI was written in 1776 and amounted to a declaration of war.

"When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bonds which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation."

The "unalienable" rights line deals with the fact that the British govenment was stepping on those rights the colonist regarded as necessary to create a decent life. " We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed." The pharse "consent to be governed" is key here.

In this part, it directly addresses the King of England:

"The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over these states. To prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world."

Then it goes on and lists the crimes which the King has committed. It ends stating:

"In every stage of these oppressions we have petitioned for redress in the most humble terms: our repeated petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have we been wanting in attention to our British brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, enemies in war, in peace friends."

It should now be clear to you that it addresses the British empire and does not create a list of rights for individuals within the United States, given that there was no United States at the time.



[edit on 18-1-2009 by Little Star]







 
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