14th Amendment

 Back when Chicago had winters, I once dragged myself through the slush into a travel agency and said:

-Get me out of here.

I hate to travel. There is some remarkable geology. In Lacrosse Wisconsin there are bluffs. There is a fun mix of prosaic and profane seeing people living on and around the bluffs.

There are also the plaques. In Pennsylvania there is mention of Jumonville. George Washington at the age of twenty murdered Jumonville causing the French and Indian War which lead to the Seven Years’ War, which lead to our revolution. The revolution was not popular, ask the Tories, who respected the king, paid their debts, and opposed slavery. 

The Evanston Illinois light house, built in 1873 after the North was freed of the South’s hatred of boondoggle. Why of all the stretches of sand along Lake Michigan was the light house built here? The light house was an emotional reaction to the sinking of the Lady Elgin in 1860. In Milwaukee there is a wonderful plaque explaining that the Irish on the Lady Elgin had it coming. The Germans wanted to secede from the Union in opposition to slavery. The Irish wanted to stay in.

The site of Pickett’s Charge in Gettysburg.

I hate the St. Louis Arch. They try to warn you: claustrophobia, acrophobia, and ochlophobia. They tell you don’t go up there. Due to construction we had to buy tickets in the museum. There was a plaque there explaining that there weren’t many Blacks in St Louis before the Civil War. The Irish were taking the work. It was cheaper to hire an Irishman for a day than keep a slave for life. Dred Scott was pissed that his owners were sending him out to find jobs.

When the Supreme Court uses arguments like natural law or constructionism, they are saying they don’t have anything else. This wasn’t the case with slavery. All stupid Taney had to say was that slavery was in the Constitution. It would have been nice if Taney had ruled that if you didn’t have work, you were no longer a slave. Taney would have been discovering a right under the 9^th amendment. The 9^th is kind of a fun meta-amendment. When the Supreme Court argues that a right isn’t covered under the Constitution, they are ignoring the 9^th. We fought a war to remove slavery from the Constitution.

The slave breeding border states would have hated such a decision. They made money selling slaves south.

Keeping the Union was not popular. It was not the peoples will. Lincoln got in on a three way, another example of the Voters Paradox. After the putative end of the war, Republicans dragged the army up to vote and dumped the territories into the count. Fortunately, the Southern raids infuriated the border states. The Democratic platform was to concede the war to the South. The South didn’t vote, we had won by force of arms and freeing the slaves. When the Southern property walked off, their financial value collapsed. The Northern banks were furious with Lincoln, they thought they were going to collect on their loans. McClellan got 45% of the vote in the North.

Rather than lining the rebels against a wall and shooting them as a sovereign nation ought, goofy Johnson followed Ceasar’s advice and pardoned them. Even so, the 14^th amendment said the rebels could no longer run for office. There was no folderol about process, popular will or which office. A sovereign state should not allow traitors to hold office, regardless of the peoples will. If you want to change the Constitution, we have process for that. Please don’t argue that an amendment is unconstitutional.

I despise the 2^nd amendment. It is ambiguous and confusing. The Supreme court shouldn’t rule against it. We should amend the Constitution to explicitly return that power to the states.

The first amendment was too mealy mouthed about government supporting religion. It seems obvious that tax money should not go to religions. Stop faith-based grants. Faith-based worked fine when it is Greek Orthodox taking care of Ukrainians. It shamelessly falls to pieces when it is Catholics serving Venezuelans. The Cruz and DeSantos Catholics are happy with undocumented immigrants. Undocumented don’t get Social Security, Minimum Wage, Unemployment, or Workmen’s Compensation. MAGA is opposed to refugees, people with status who don’t do as they are told, and who may someday vote.

Catholic “charities” is also taking tax money to oppose the rights of equality and privacy.  

MAGA isn’t fascist. Fascists had ideals. Maga is a pseudo nihilist, sometimes antiimperialist, pro-Russian belief in slavery and forced pregnancy. Maga wants crippled orphan children working 12-hour shifts in packing plants.

Popular will overriding the law is a fascist argument.

The only way individual Democrats can fight for Reconstruction is to crossover to the Republican primaries and vote for Haley. At least Haley hasn't shipped immigrants.