Oh the joys of blogging.
I just spent five hours — couldn’t sleep last night — writing a blog article on the Constitution. I tried to create a screenshot of an email I had received that was going to be the finishing piece of my post.
Outlook 2003 appeared to be locked up. So I clicked the “x” in the corner to close it.
Unfortunately, the system apparently had already closed it for me. Immediately underneath it was the article I was writing. So the click I intended for Outlook registered on the article.
And five hours of work vanished right before my eyes.
5 responses so far ↓
1 LQ // Jul 26, 2005 at 7:32 am
That really sucks Rick! 🙁 So sorry to hear that.
2 Brad Mills // Jul 26, 2005 at 12:03 pm
Your in luck! The Constitution really doesn’t matter anymore. No need to explain a document that really no longer holds any value. The power is in the hands of the Supreme Court. 😉
3 Rick Horowitz // Jul 26, 2005 at 1:59 pm
Funny you should say that. That was pretty much what the article was about.
The article talked about how most Americans misunderstand the point of the Constitution, with the result that most people, including congressional representatives, Presidents and judges, think it means the opposite of what it really means.
And I disagree with the idea that “power” is wholly in the hands of the Supreme Court — depending on how you meant that. Most often when that statement is made, it appears that the speaker thinks that’s a bad thing. Usually, they’re reacting because the Supreme Court is doing its constitutional duty, and preventing the other branches of government from overstepping the bounds the Constitution laid out for them by enforcing an unconstitutional majoritarian view on the minority. In that case, the Supreme Court is exercising its rightful power; its duty.
People who make complaints about the Court when it performs its constitutional duty reveal (at least) two things about their lack of understanding: 1) They don’t know what kind of governmental system the United States uses (hint: it’s not a democracy; the Founders rightly considered democracies inherently evil); 2) They’ve never read the Constitution…and probably don’t even have a clue about the meaning and intent of it, or of the supporting documents, such as the Federalist Papers.
Oh how I wish more people would read it. It is, after all, pretty short and can be read by most folk in one sitting.
And it’s supposed to be the bedrock upon which our government rests.
4 Larraine // Jul 29, 2005 at 4:40 pm
I read somewhere that the Constitution was read to people without telling them what it was and the reaction was that it was a “Communist” document. What does THAT tell you?
5 Rick Horowitz // Jul 29, 2005 at 4:48 pm
Interesting that you should mention that. Back in Kimr 3–5 — which is “June 2004” if you put your fingers on the right part of the keyboard — I wrote an article titled Dealing with Partisan Writing: Some Practical Suggestions. In that article, I pointed out the similarities between the Russian and American Constitutions — and the fact that what made the American Constitution different was the way it was applied.
Just since June 2004, those differences have melted away. Now the American government treats the Constitution of the United States in exactly the same way that the Russian government treats the Russian Constitution.
In both cases, they serve as window dressing; in both cases, if it these were real showroom windows, we’d be complaining about false advertising.
Because, today, what you read is not what you get.
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