NationStates Jolt Archive

In Ayn Rand's The Virtue Selfishness, she writes:

"A private individual may do anything except that which is legally forbidden; a government official may do nothing except that which is legally permitted."

Would a viewpoint such as this one, that very strictly interprets the powers of the government, and openly interprets the freedom of an individual be benefitial?

I think that that type of ambiguous open endedness has allowed for lots of unnecessary beaurocratic expansions that have eroded our freedoms. Would it prevent the government from asserting for itself new powers that weren't expressly designated to it?

Such as-
- Unjustified unnecessary corporate welfare
- Deciding we can enforce U.N. resolutions without a clear form of consent
- Patriot act powers
- Draft
- add your own...

Discuss!!

Ideas can never end or limit corruption.

It's a human fault that people will quite often act in their own best interests.

A nice idea, but like communism, fated to fail...

Ideas can never end or limit corruption.

It's a human fault that people will quite often act in their own best interests.

A nice idea, but like communism, fated to fail...

WHAT??? You understand that IDEAS are the foundation of any legislation ever put in place. Would you have said that to our founding fathers as they wrote our constitution? If corruption can be curbed in any way at all, it can be curbed by ideas.

Yeah you sound clever musing about human faults and all but there certainly are ways we can affect human behavior. I hate when you asses put no thought into any shit at all and just tie ideas to these supposedly unshakable maxims ("it's fated to fail") saying that the issue is hopelessly this way or hopelessly that way... that's stupid and its a cheap way of getting out of actually thinking about it while at the same time coming off as if you had done a lot of thinking about it... even if your maxim suggestions are true you contribute nothing by just saying they are true... you would have helped by saying "no" and for "this" and "that" reasons, laying out a framework of logic. And if you knew what you were talking about or actually cared to have a thoughtful discussion you would have been more interested in trying to SUPPORT such a maxim rather than just floating it out there as if it invalidates any need to use reason to come to any conclusions..

And on a seperate note, in order to make sense (and you do make sense on this part) you would have to be implying that "act(ing) in their own best interests" is synonymous with acting AGAINST other people's interests, which isn't true at all. A person can do something that benefits themself and harms no one.

Ok that's my rant.. but seriously if anyone wants to throw around some THOUGHTFULL discussion I would be more than happy to consider it...

When you talk about corruption with regard to corporations and government, its blatantly obvious that somewhere along the line someone, if not a group of people are going to be harmed by the actions of a corrupt politician.

With regard to corruption and the introduction of bills such as the patriot act, it is obvious that innocent americans may be harmed by its use in law enforcement.

Therefore, someone will at some point down the line be harmed by politicians acting in their own self interests.

I'm sorry I didn't qualify my statement more fully, I thought it was generally self explanatory. One of the reasons corruption is so hard to stamp out is that it can be quite hard to detect. If one company "donates" to a politician in order to attempt to have a beneficial piece of legislation introduced, thats quite hard to detect.

Eitherway, while your idea may work on some level, I doubt it would ever be implemented in the government for the simple reason that it restricts their powers. Politicians more than likely don't want that, and even if by some miracle it was introduced then they would probably find some way to circumvent it.

As a piece of useful legislation, this idea rests on the theory that people will fight to support and uphold it. I do not beleive that with the current state of affairs it can ever be the case, therefore, I beleive it is destined to fail.

Better?

It would all depend on who makes the laws, wouldn't it?

There are plenty of judges in this countrry who will bypass democratic process to promote their own agendas.

More new powers the gov't shouldn't have:

*"Regulation" (cough- censorship) of the media
*Welfare

"A private individual may do anything except that which is legally forbidden; a government official may do nothing except that which is legally permitted."
Nope, wouldn't work. Part of this is because it happens to be the government that decides what is legally permitted or forbidden. The best ways to limit corruption are democracy and a free media.