So, what IS the limit?

[badlydrawnjeff.livejournal.com]

Radley Balko's a libertarian, yes - writes for Reason, has his blog, etc. He's also done great work on drug policy, and may have single-handedly gotten someone a retrial for a botched murder case.

Anyway, he posted this question on his blog tonight in response to the left wing responses to the health care reform lawsuit result yesterday, and I'm sharing it here because I am curious:

Putting aside what’s codified Bill of Rights, which was ratified after the main body of the Constitution, do you believe the Constitution puts any restrictions on the powers of the federal government?

If your answer is yes, what restrictions would those be? And what test would you use to determine what the federal government can and can’t do? I’ve written this before, but after Wickard, Raich, and now, if you support it, the health insurance mandate, it’s hard to see what’s left that would be off-limits.

...

If your answer is no, that is, that the Constitution puts no real restraints on the federal government at all, why do you suppose they bothered writing and passing one in the first place?

...

I guess to get at the meat of the disagreement, I should ask one more: Do you buy into the idea that the people delegate certain, limited powers to the government through the Constitution, or do you believe that the government can do whatever it wants, save for a few restrictions outlined in the Constitution?

I use my Tenther icon ironically right now, but I think it is a reasonable, rational question. I can get why people view the General Welfare clause expansively, even if they're wrong, for example, but I can't wrap my head around how people cannot see this as overly broad, or why anyone's really willing to dismiss certain Constitutional facts out of hand. I'm actually really curious here - if there's something I've been missing all this time, I'd genuinely love to hear it.

Comments

[gunslnger.livejournal.com]

You didn't make a point. You just said "Group Y believes X and will do Z" regardless of what people in Group Y say. And mrbogey and I only snark at you because we've long since learned that you don't ever make any real points, you only follow this same pattern, so it's pointless to discuss anything with you.

[underlankers.livejournal.com]

Feeling's mutual. I cannot name a time where we've disagreed on something that you've ever made a point that was either 1) True, or 2) connected to the real world.

[gunslnger.livejournal.com]

Because I rarely talk about the real world, I deal primarily with the theoretical when discussing on here, on the way things should be, not the way they are.