I do not have a lot of time to answer questions, but send an email if you are interested Bill James
My name is Bill James. I am a 1972 West Point grad and Infantry veteran. Why we have perpetual oil-wars forced a deep study into how that path to war was built by the Federal highway monopoly.
Climate Change Root Cause is the same monopoly that mandates burning oil to move two tons to move a person.
A Tyranny of the Majority is willing to mortgaging the future labor of children to obtain $27 trillion more in benefits than are willing to be paid in taxes. And, tilt the balance of nature into Climate Change. And, mandate perpetual oil-wars.
The key to solving these defects is to repeal the 17th Amendment, direct election of Senators. As with the 16th and 18th Amendments, the consequences were different than what was expected:
- 16th Amendment granted the Federal government the power to tax income to reduce the hardship on low-income working-class people.
- Previously, Federal income came significantly from taxes on imports. This consumption tax put an unjust burden on the lower classes.
- The tax was intended to assure the national defense would be funded by those most benefiting from that defense and the most to lose, those making over $350,000 (in 2010 dollars). In 2010 definitions, the "income" tax was a tax on "capital gains". It was not passed to tax wages except in war as a last resort.
- World War I made an easy excuse to shift the definition of "income" from "capital gains" to "wages".
- The original meaning of the words and levels of income taxed should be restored.
- 17th Amendment changed Senators being elected by State Legislatures to popular election:
- The intent was to reduce the obvious corruption of a Senate seat being bought in Montana.
- The unintended consequence was the cost of political corruption was reduced from buying half a state legislature to merely contributing to a Senate campaign.
- Senators now represent special interests associations, corporation, and unions instead of States.
- Catering to those special interest, Congress violated the "post Roads" restriction to tax and build infrastructure to sell the products of those special interests.
- Oil-war, Climate Change, and $27 trillion in Federal debt are consequences of the 17th Amendment reducing the cost of political corruption to merely contributing to a Senate campaign.
- 18th Amendment waged war on selling a beer.
- The intent of to use the war-powers of the Federal government to make a better society. The Federal government was created in war to wage war. The Constitution states this mission in the Preamble, by mandating it "provide for the defense of liberty" and limits it to only "promote the general welfare"
- The Constitution very specifically limits Federal policing of individual Americans to 5 crimes:
- Crimes against the Laws of Nations
- Suppress insurrections
- Runaway slaves. This last mixed commerce and war-powers resulting in 600,000 dead soldiers in the Civil War.
- Adding selling a beer to the crimes punishable by an institution created in war to wage war resulted in:
- Citizen contempt for laws.
- Organized crime.
- Although repealed for alcohol it has been continued with the War on Drugs (note the Federal program name clearly states the nature of the Federal government). The US now has the highest incarceration rate in the world as the Federal government wars on citizens.
The 16th Amendment should be returned to its original intent and levels of taxation.
The 17th Amendment should be repealed to increase the cost of political corruption from contributing to a Senate campaign to buying half a state legislature. Repealing the 17th Amendment is the key step to enforcing Divided Sovereignty and ending the mixing of commercial self-interest with war-powers that is the Root Cause of Climate Change and Oil-wars.