Yep, I agree, to putting back the appointed part. This would resolve term limits, along with other issues.
I've been trying to educate people about this for a long time now. Amazing how many people think how the governments wants them to think.

I remember seeing a video out there somewhere on youtube where Eric Holder endorsed using brain washing techniques to control the population. Guess he read Hermann Goering's comments about how they controlled the German people and thought it was good idea.
.

"An item on that agenda that comes up every single election....
ending the electoral college process and replacing it with a straight vote for president."

It is only brought up by the losing side, however.

You'll find full agreement from me on returning to the Senate representing the States and not the people. In my formulations you go one step further: convert income tax into an apportioned state tax. Take each state's percentage of the U.S. population and charge that state government that percentage of the federal budget. However the individual state wants to legally obtain that money - such as via income taxes, property taxes, etc.. - is up to it.

Combining these two would, in my view, be a significant roadblock to expanding government largess as well as a strong incentive to reduce it. My reasoning goes along this line:

If the Senate, in whom we entrust the purse strings, is chosen by the State's government (I'm conceptually OK with appointment by Governors even but I think recursion is the proper solution here) and the state gets an invoice then you have a means to directly tie one aspect of performance to the Senate. More commonly you highlight the net effect of a Senator's votes on spending by making it explicit.

Right now Senators are elected generally on what they "bring back from Washington". And the costs of these "victories" are hidden because it is all rolled up into an amount the average person has great difficulty comprehending.

The political effect of even just the state apportioned fee as opposed to direct citizen taxation at the federal level leverages the fact that Senate representation is constant - bigger states don't get more Senators - and this disproportionately (which is not inherently a bad thing) favors the states with smaller populations because the more the government spends the more per-capita they have to collect - and the more direct the impact can be felt by the average voter.

You could then track and show a Senator's "track record" by correcting their votes against the changes in the state's "union membership dues". "Senator Fubar's votes in favor of X directly increased Vermont's federal taxes by $NNN" has a decidedly different tone than what we have now.

Alone this change would do pretty well in the service of lowering federal expanse and largesse. However, by combining it with State government selection of Senators you place the responsibility for selecting said Senator into the hand(s) of those who have to directly deal with the financial consequences - the State (via Governors or legislatures) itself.

It is possible the above combination would place a greater emphasis on the same fiscal awareness in the House elections, but that would be icing on the cake.

Your comment is contradictory. Half of all ILLEGAL immigrant could not have come here LEGALLY.

Also in support of this argument is the clause in the 14th amendment regarding "subject to its jurisdiction" specifically because non-citizens can consult an embassy or consulate.

"The People of the United States ratified the Constitution - not the remaining population of the world."

That is not in dispute and is irrelevant to the question at hand. Who ratified is is not the same as whom what is ratified applies to.

Your argument means that any government agent can stop, search, detain, censor, discriminate based on sec, color, creed, etc., kill any and all non-citizens and so on for whatever reason the individual feels like because, as you assert, the individual has no rights.

I argue this is in opposition to the founder's concept of rights not springing from government but being inalienable. Whether you or I agree with that reasoning aside, that is what those who wrote the constitution reasoned regarding the origin of rights. If indeed rights are independent of government the constitution, as a document intended to prevent government from abridging said rights must apply to all people in the government's jurisdiction. To assert otherwise is to assert that mankind is not "endowed by his creator with certain inalienable rights" but that these are granted by government and can thus be applied selectively.

Regarding the right to self-defense, that's really not an argument. If you have a right to your life, you must have the right to defend it, by definition.

Indeed, note that you do not have a right to habeas corpus, but that according to the constitution it is a privilege - something granted by the state. That said it is held today to mean a right, so I'll refer to it as such here. This makes this particular one interesting because the SCOTUS addressed the question of said right regarding non-citizens when it ruled the Military Commissions Act could not deny that right to detainees at Guantamo. The decision clearly stated they had that protection - and nobody involved argued they did not. If the constitution's protections of rights applied only to U.S. Citizens this decision would be impossible to rectify with the constitution. Indeed, Scalia was very vocal about the constitution applying to people because they were in the U.S. jurisdiction - which is how this affected the decision.

The question in this case was not whether the detainees did not have the rights due to being non-citizens, but specifically that they were not inside the United States. I'm fairly certain that if the Justice Department and/or the administration had any reason to believe non-citizens were not afforded the protection of their rights that would have been the argument and it would have been, as they say, an "open and shut case". Reading Scalia's, and every dissenting opinion actually, reveals the same thing.

This understanding that the constitution is not limited to citizens only dates back in the SCOTUS to the late 1800s in Yock Wo v Hopkins when it wrote:

"The rights of the petitioners, as affected by the proceedings of which they complain, are not less because they are aliens and subjects of the emperor of China...". This case dealt with the 14th amendment as a limitation on the State government (as it was clearly intended). However, Wong Wing v. United States upheld that the fifth amendment's use of "persons" and not "citizens" extends "to all persons within the jurisdiction".

On that note, in order to read it as you do, non-citizens would have to be non-persons. Note that even in the 1880's the supreme court held that corporations were considered legal persons. The notion that in the 1880's the constitution applied to corporations, even foreign corporations, and citizens only thus excluding aliens is absurd untenable.

Indeed, the cases (such as the Guantanamo case mentioned above) which argue whether or not constitutionally protected rights are afforded to given person revolve around whether the person was/is within "territorial jurisdiction". This is the reason embassies and military bases are referred to internationally as "sovereign soil" of the holding nation as opposed to the host country. To be otherwise would prevent the application of "native" country law to embassy property due to lack of jurisdiction.

You can also see this understanding in the desire to keep terrorist detainees off of "American Soil". If Guantanamo was, for some strange reason, on embassy grounds there would have been no question of the applicability of constitutional rights to detainees there because embassies are legally the soil of the origin country.

Further, regarding the 14th the contestation of jurisdiction was specifically between federal and State jurisdiction, with intent of the 14th to make clear that being in a state doesn't remove the jurisdiction of the federal government regarding rights and "privileges and immunities". IN particular regard to privilege because not only Writ of Habeas Corpus is a privilege but so is voting and the authors wanted to ensure the states could not prevent blacks from the privilege of voting nor the equal protection under the law afforded by the constitution. It was not about citizens vs. aliens - that had already been known.

Indeed if you read the dissent in Slaughterhouse you'll find more support for the rights of man not being granted by government and that the 14th merely enshrined common law on that regard. While it was a dissenting opinion it was the opinion referenced and accepted by later courts.

And yes, private companies, and parties such as ourselves, have the right to establish rules regarding the use of their property but those rules have limits. For example, you can't simply shoot anyone on your property because they don't like rum, wore a yellow shirt, or happen to have skin of a different color. To say the governments of the union or the states can do so seems absurd to me and is certainly not in accordance with the notion that we have inalienable rights as opposed to ones granted by government benevolent wisdom.

The constitution as well as case law and arguments over the last couple hundred years all clearly demonstrate that any and all person in the "territorial jurisdiction" of the United States are afforded the same rights - but not necessarily the same privileges and immunities. Note the applicable phrase is "territorial jurisdiction" not "original jurisdiction".

Heck, it is even in movies. I don't recall the name at the moment but a Schwarzenegger movie where he played a KGB agent working in the U.S. with the aid of american authorities even had it correct when they made a punchline subplot where Arnold's character had to Mirandize even Soviet nationals while in the United States.

So yes, illegal aliens have the right to keep and bear arms just as you and I do, along with our other rights, just not necessarily the same privileges and immunities.

Depending on what exactly you mean and how you go about it, yes. The constitution doesn't address what you do outside of the country's territorial jurisdiction. Well, outside of allowing the government to hire privateers. ;)

Great argument!

The problem is jurisdiction. The Constitution, and by derivation devises a system of government for the People of the United States. It has no jurisdiction over any others. Does that mean that non-citizens have no rights? Not at all. But penalties for abrogation of laws are always subject to jurisdictional claims, and therein lies the rub. The Constitution doesn't have original jurisdiction over non-citizens.

Now is there a legitimate reason to treat anyone here in the United States as if they have the protection of the Fourth Amendment (the presumption of innocence)? I think there is - not only from a practicality standpoint but from reciprocity- and standards-viewpoints as well. That being said, however, once one is under suspicion of criminal action and it is divulged that they are not an American Citizen, the jurisdictional matters dictate that law enforcement tread a completely different path than when dealing with an American Citizen. That we may grant them guest privileges which begin with the privileges we afford our citizens is a good starting place, but these are privileges to the non-citizen - not rights. That distinction is critical.

"Uh, not so. The very first words to the Constitution define what People means and it clearly states in VERY large letters: "We the People of the United States of America.""

False. This is establishing who this is done on behalf of. The phrase "the People of" is not the same thing as "the people".

"We can be good hosts and only bother them when they break our rules, or we can refuse them entry in the first place. But they are our guests - not our citizens."

This does not support your position, it counters it. The reference to citizens was regarding claiming they are no longer citizens of their country of origin against their will. All a guest had to do at that time to become a citizen of the U.S. was to decide be one. The distinction was made because of the laws of other nations regarding citizenship (or subject status for monarchies), not to prevent guests from exercising their rights.

As much as I suspect we both dislike states doing this, I don't think the fed has legal authority to stop them.