Comments on: Reflections on a statement by Edward R. Murrow on Senator Joseph McCarthy and an “Age of Unreason”

By: vey9

vey9 — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 14:37:02 +0000

"disunity by the powergrabbing of an overextended Federal Government that the founding fathers would have looked upon with horror."

Which founding fathers? Almost immediately, the Federal Government began throwing it's weight around. The Whiskey Rebellion began because the big distillers in Philadelphia were given a huge tax break while federal tax collectors went out into the hinterlands of western Pennsylvania to levy higher taxes on the small, home-based distillery businesses. Worse, the Government wanted cash money, which was hard to come by in a barter based economy.

You are right about State's Rights, the Civil War settled that argument. If a State can't quit the union, then it loses it's ace card or another way to say it is that "People went into the war saying, "The United States are" and came out saying, "The United States is."

I find that people that complain about "our founding fathers" really don't know much about them or the history of their times.

By: Leonidas

Leonidas — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 13:56:59 +0000

Tim Russert was as close as we got to Murrow recently. Jack Tapper shows potential though.

By: TheMagicalSkyFather

TheMagicalSkyFather — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 07:41:41 +0000

Sadly his name is Jon Stewart and he would really like to just be a comedian.

By: JSpencer

JSpencer — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 05:00:03 +0000

It amazes me that here we are in the 21st century and there are more people than ever who seem to be living in the 19th. Clearly the high standards I had assumed were universal only existed in the imaginations of a few. Yes indeed, welcome to the age of unreason! Where is the Edward R. Murrow of today?

By: TheMagicalSkyFather

TheMagicalSkyFather — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 23:44:43 +0000

Wow, I agree with you, its been a while but its always nice:). I really see no way out of it short of a truly Libertarian shift though. We would need to erase most of our history and regulations. Empire America would need to end and we would need to pull out of all of our world bases, all fed programs would need to end and we would no longer be the bankers and corps favorite muscle to bully others into appeasing them. The down side is that they would eventually turn those weapons on us in an attempt to strong arm us into this or that treaty or trade deal. The advantage of a strong fed is that we are a nation to listen too or run from. The good news is that with our current military superiority it would take 20 yrs or so for them to be able to gather an army large enough to make it happen but then they would still need to deal with the gun bunnies in the mountains screaming “Wolverines.” It's a common punch-line but its true, think we are mean to each other? I double dare you to try something on us and see how cruel we can be to people that are not our neighbors.

By: Leonidas

Leonidas — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 23:27:50 +0000

We lost our Republic after the Civil War when we allowed the Federal government to encroach upon the States. We were founded as The United States of America, unfortunately we are more and more becoming a federally controlled nation, a United State of America, united in disunity by the powergrabbing of an overextended Federal Government that the founding fathers would have looked upon with horror.

By: TheMagicalSkyFather

TheMagicalSkyFather — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 22:38:13 +0000

I have a theory that we are entering a reverse dark age. The dark ages of course were so bad because we lost so much knowledge so quickly, at least thats what upsets me about it. I think we are seeing too much information and knowledge without the ability to sift through it and separate the fact from the propaganda which would have much the same historical affect as the dark ages but is caused by too much instead of too little. I am not be comforting am I…