re: How would you change the Constitution to keep us from getting here?

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Maybe I'm biased b/c I'm from a basket case of corruption that's quite purple.

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I've lived in Purple and Blue states, in both cases they would have elected their favorite child of the controlling party, much the same as the starting favorite in the primaries are now.

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It's certainly one of the less impactful, but somehow super popular talking points in this area. It's like someone came up with it as a major talking point one day b/c it created a difference from the OG constitution and that alone was enough.

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It is a big deal… senate was never supposed to be a mass popularity contest. It was a mistake to basically turn them into 6yr representatives.

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Don’t change the constitution you dumb arse.

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or add shitty amendments.

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Don’t change the constitution you dumb arse.

You need to figure out how to keep rotten motherfrickers out of government.

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Correct.

Forfeiture is blatantly unconstitutional but they do it anyway.

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I disagree partly with this - narrowing the Commerce Clause risks stripping the federal government of its ability to address collective-action problems (civil rights enforcement, environmental protection, labor standards, and public health). States have historically failed to handle address these and I simply don’t trust them.

Additionally, simply removing government power assumes a level playing field that doesn’t exist, where “personal responsibility” can’t compensate for structural disadvantages like poverty, discrimination, or market concentration.

I am a Republican in principle, but as a trained lawyer I cannot agree government should be abolished. The problem isn’t government per se, but how to democratically constrain and deploy it to safeguard dignity, opportunity, and equal rights.

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Your trolling has jumped the shark dude

I would be more precise in my language in the 1st (freedom of, not freedom from), 2nd (shall not be infringed being much more clearly stated as an individual right which can never ever ever ever be abridged under any circumstance), 4th (eliminate the “I smell weed” loophole for searches and try to craft some stricter regimes around traffic stops, this precision on searches would also eliminate warrantless wiretaps and surveillance of meta data), 14th (children are citizens if born here so long as their parents had permission to be here), and 15th Amendments (I would refine this in order to ensure incorporation of individual rights at the state levels but try to avoid it becoming a catch-all for federal intervention as it has become).

I would be much more precise regarding the interstate commerce clause to prevent Wickard v. Fillburn style nonsense.

I would be more precise regarding the taxation powers to prevent income taxes and the like. I would also eliminate the 16th Amendment.

I would explicitly define the “waters of the united states” to prevent the EPA and Army Corps of engineers interpreting every low spot that holds waters as “waters of the united states” that they have dominion over. Only navigable waterways, suitable for commerce (has to float a boat during the dry season), connected to the ocean via nature (i.e. not made navigable via locks and canals) are considered waters of the united states. If there are rapids separating one navigable stretch from the rest of the river that flows to the ocean, only the portion downstream of the rapids is waters of the united states. States can make the other waters state lands.

With a strict stance against prohibition, there would never be any 18th or 21st amendments.

I would eliminate the 17th Amendment to return election of senators to state legislatures, and I would actually put that language into the constitution rather than leaving it up to the states.

I would include a provision that calls for expansion of the house of representatives as the overall population increases. The idea would be for House districts to remain smallish. There would also be specific language preventing boundary lines from being drawn by any means other than geographical features (rivers/mountains), municipal boundaries (including subdivisions like city council wards), and state lines. There would be provisions dealing with ensuring geographically concise and connected territory that reflects the cultural boundaries of communities. The idea is to prevent mark of zorro style districts.

I would explicitly include a provision that states “campaign contributions are not considered ‘free speech’, corporations are not considered ‘persons’ with respect to political campaigns, and ‘paid television advertisements’ are not ‘short films’ and thus not considered limitless free speech that anyone can dump endless amounts of money into buying. This would be tricky to word, but the idea would be that all contributions to political campaigns must come from actual people, not corporations, and corporations buying blocks of tv ads to support/attack a given candidate isn’t the same as a citizen making a short film.

I would create a formal process for secession. There would be different requirements for territories vs states, but make it really really difficult for states to secede without broad support from both the voters and state legislatures. Notice I said difficult, not impossible. Probably would require a 2/3s majority of votes in both houses of state legislatures and of the people in that state. Territories would have lower thresholds for independence.

Now, if I have crazy powers, I would even start redrawing state borders, possibly increase the number of states in the continental US. The idea would be for state borders to more accurately represent the cultures of the people within them to reduce the amount of tension within states. For example, under no circumstances should Shreveport and New Orleans be ruled by the same government. They have completely polar opposite cultural values, economic concerns, etc. No more having Chicago completely dominate a large agricultural state that has nothing in common with Chicago. Pennsylvania would be split in two along the mountains, so that Pittsburgh and Philadelphia would each be in different states. This would allow states to be more distinct from one-another rather than just being largely arbitrary boundaries with no identity.

Term limits.

Make it where the Federal Government can only spend on Military and maintenance of facilities. All other spending is handled at the state level.

Get rid of the Income Tax, Estate Tax, Property Tax, etc.

Shut down all agencies at the federal level including the FBI, CIA, ATF, and everything else. The military can handle intelligence activities.

You can go read about it. This isn't a hypothetical discussion. The "smoke filled rooms" and the inability to get people over the line are why we changed systems. Those people who ended up voting were also permitted to run in those same "smoke filled rooms". This stuff actually happened and is documented. It's not a hypothetical conversation.

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kingbob

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Nice post

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Don’t change the constitution you dumb arse.

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Why not change the weak points of the constitution that helped get us here?