Uncle, Can you Spare a Dime?

AmericanFirstPrinciples.org

The number of individuals employed under the Constitution of the United States will be much smaller than the number employed under the particular States. There will consequently be less of personal influence on the side of the former than of the latter. -- James Madison, Federalist 45

Another quaint idea stood on its head by 100 years of progressivism...

Senators John McCain and Tom Coburn, doing the job liberal senators just won’t do, have produced a catalog of “stimulus” waste.  Liberals and their press apologists are responding with howls of indignation.

Regardless of the value of exotic ant study, or the merits of giving monkeys cocaine, questions remain:

Why is the federal government providing money for private enterprise projects?

Why do the states have to go begging to the federal government to replace municipal sidewalks?

What if the federal government confined itself to its constitutionally mandated responsibilities instead of trying to “run the country,” running us all broke in the process?

Liberal use of that phrase, “run the country” belies the progressive poison that has leached into our national bloodstream. To progressive anti-constitutionalists, we are subjects to be rewarded by paternalistic philosopher kings raining pennies from Washington.

This perversion encourages state subordination to the federal government and fosters dependency, and that’s just the way progressives imagine it should be.

Fight the Power!
Imagine a world where the states kept more of the tax money of their constituents and took care of their own issues, instead of Coloradans paying for a project in Washington.

At times like this it is helpful to read the founders, while pondering boiling frogs...

The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the federal government are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State governments are numerous and indefinite. The former will be exercised principally on external objects, as war, peace, negotiation, and foreign commerce...”

The powers reserved to the several States will extend to all the objects which, in the ordinary course of affairs, concern the lives, liberties, and properties of the people, and the internal order, improvement, and prosperity of the State. -- James Madison, Federalist 45

There is much wisdom in how the founders set things up. Local and state governments are better positioned to tailor their efforts to the needs of the people. At just under 5 million Americans, we were not a one-size-fits-all nation when the US Constitution was ratified, and we sure as hell ain’t a one-size-fits-all nation now.

“I see,… and with the deepest affliction, the rapid strides with which the federal branch of our government is advancing towards the usurpation of all the rights reserved to the States, and the consolidation in itself of all powers, foreign and domestic; and that, too, by constructions which, if legitimate, leave no limits to their power…  -- Thomas Jefferson to William Branch Giles, 1825. The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, (Memorial Edition) Lipscomb and Bergh, editors, ME 16:146

Imagine what Jefferson would say today...