right PD. Things are so different today than they were back then. Even meanings of words have changed over the years, so it is very difficult.

I did leave out the caveat that our founding fathers seem to have problems with, and that as you mentioned were the rights of women and slaves. What the Constitution originally stated and what was practiced were two different things. It is a shame that it took adding amendments to clarify these issues but it is what it is. It just proves how complicated and even contradictory the foundations of our country were. No wonder we wrestle with some of their meanings and interpretations to this day.

Click on the word welfare and go to the US Constitution dictionary.

http://www.usconstitution.net/const.html#A1Sec8

Not everyone was provided the same rights under the constitution until women's sufferage, civil rights, etc were passed. The minority was not always protected. But you are correct on defining and interpreting General Welfare. Until congress agrees on one definition (at least for the this time in history) it can and will be devisive.

No problem, that is an issue when we have but so much space to respond and it is in writing. Hard to read intent sometimes. But I do have to address your comment on majority rules. What you describe is pure democracy-some can call it mob rule as well. Our nation is a republic which is best described as representative democracy. That is meant to say that the minority has equal representation and is afforded protection from majority rule. The Bill of Rights, how Congress is designed, the electoral college, etc are all examples of this protection in action. So no, the majority really does not rule and for a good reason. So when it comes to general welfare the framers left that wide open with the intent (from what I have ascertained) that future generations could decide through the representative process what exactly is contained in general welfare. It is up to us to decide what is best for the whole.

No you didn't specifically say the government owes us everything we need, I just interpreted your statement "Many, like myself, interpret the general welfare to mean just that. What is good for the populace in general is good for the country." Which it can be intrepretted as I did. Sorry if that's not what you meant. And I remember a time when in this country, democracy meant the majority rules, what is best for the majority of the country. Of course, that has never really been the case, as since the beginning of politics in this country, whoever had money and was famous, or in the limelight has ruled the country.

Maybe not 85%. But consider . . . one in four of us gets cancer in a lifetime (and that rate is going up). It takes hundreds of thousands of dollars to fight cancer in one person (if surgery, chemo, and radiation are all done--it can go up to a million with the stage 4 cases). I am one of the fortunate ones--those three therapies come under Tricare for me after my 26 years of service to my country. However . . . I am very aware that does not make my treatment (for breast cancer) free.
Very few people die at home of old age anymore. Most get something pretty expensive--if not cancer, then heart disease, stroke, or diabetes.
If we put our money in the bank right now, it brings a very low rate of interest. Neither does the federal government invest our tax money at high rates of return.
If almost every one of us is expensive at least once before the end of life, how does that all get paid for? Cheers, MGM

I question your statement that 85% of our salary would go to support a healthcare system. We are already paying for the uninsured through writeoffs from treatment of those w/o insurance. They get treatment when it is most costly (an emergency and/or in later disease stages). Those costs are passed to those in the system and that is a fact. Others are the working millions whose employers cannot afford coverage and they themselves cannot afford it either. With these realities in mind, and foregoing any usual ideology, what do you propose we do? Continually arguing about it and making people's lives a political hot potato has gotten us nowhere. We have a great system but access to it is the problem. We can put into place reasonable limits, etc to mitigate fraud or unneccessary coverages. But being one of the, if not the, worst developed country in the world on access to healthcare is not an envia

'Course in the framers' day, it was a *good* thing to not be eligible for universal health care (leeches, being bled, etc.). They could not have foreseen where health care has gone. We have the best system in the world at the upper levels. Now the question is, do we make the upper levels available to all, at a cost of about 85% of our salary going to taxes, or do we make some scaled down version our "standard"? Cheers, MGM (remember, once we have told people that basic health care is their "right" even when they have the "right" to sit idle and not work, they will soon think that the best, experimental care for heart attacks, strokes, etc. is their "right," too. They will not settle for "middle of the road" because we are teaching them that they have "rights" to the same services as the people who are entrepreneurs making our economy grow. In fact, we teach them that entrepreneurs are evil and deserve th

In response to this: "PD, I read "General Welfare" as the country. In my view (only my opinion here) the way you view "General Welfare", the governement is responsible for providing all of us houses, food, jobs, everything we need. Which is not what this country was founded on." I never said the govt was responsible for providing houses, food, etc. That is putting context into my commentary that is not there. What I said is that general welfare was not defined (most likely the framers knew this could change with the times and needs of the country) and as such is up to debate. We need to debate the crucial issue of health insurance on its merits, i.e. importance we give to correcting the deficiencies. Anyone using a Constitutional basis for debate is looking at it incorrectly, as that document does not mention many things the framers had no conceivable idea would arise. That is my point.

PD, I read "General Welfare" as the country. In my view (only my opinion here) the way you view "General Welfare", the governement is responsible for providing all of us houses, food, jobs, everything we need. Which is not what this country was founded on.

Please read the comments. The health system you describe is a mandatory one that everyone would have to join. No one is proposing that type of system. The system being discussed is a parallel system that allows those who want to keep what they have now while having another that those uninsured people can join at affordable group style rates. The lower income brackets would get assistance much in the same way they do now. It is disgusting that in this day and age working individuals cannot get health insurance due to the cost. Many of these folks work for small firms that cannot afford a healthcare plan for employees. And for the ones who do buy it, it is costly and can be cancelled at the insurer's whim bankrupting the "covered" person if the cancellation was due to illness. And that is happening more often nowadays.

Of course, defining general welfare is the issue. Remember the old quote about democracy only existing until the majority realize they can vote themselves a raise from the public purse? There are those among us who believe that everyone should have exactly the same wage, no matter what they do, and they would call a mandatory, living wage, even for those who don't work, a "general welfare" issue. All these other issues come off of that. Do we owe health care to everyone, regardless of their efforts or lack thereof? What about the young, rich IT people who work as contractors and don't *want* to pay for healthcare because they are young and healthy? Others don't want to participate because they are military or have a good job that really does cover all their medical expenses, so leveling the field would actually make these folks go backwards. For everyone we bring to a higher standard, someone

Many, like myself, interpret the general welfare to mean just that. What is good for the populace in general is good for the country. Healthcare is deemed by many to be of national importance for a number of reasons: the uninsured do place an economic drag on the healthcare system and it is the underwiting of such medical precedures for the uninsured that are then forced on the insured to pay for. Try to deny that is a fact. By developing a parellel system that the uninsured (many of which are working by the way) can buy into will resolve that situation. A healthy population is a strong one. You on the other hand interpret the general welfare to be quite different, i.e. let the market take care of everybody and let govt be just for defense purposes. The framers did not consider many issues as they were not psychics and general welfare is obviously a point up for debate. No one is right and no one is wrong

Note that I pointed out that since FDR, Article I section 8's intent has been ignored more than followed. Obama's health care plan is a gross extension of that trend, but he is not the first.

A1S8 lists the powers granted to Congress for which it is authorized to levy taxes. The phrase, "the general welfare," has been perverted to render the rest of the Section meaningless. It is now interpreted as 'You are allowed to do only the following things, Item 1, Item 2, Item 3 and anything else you think would be warm and fuzzy.'

Why list specific powers and then throw in a phrase that makes a list meaningless? Its pretty clear that the framers meant by 'the general welfare' things that would benefit the country as a whole.

Read A1S8 and then tell me if an honest interpretation would allow the nationalization of the health care industry, fully 1/7th of the economy?

The section you mention is about the Legislative Branch and the powers of Congress. What exactly are you saying that BO plans to violate with respect to this section? Are you maybe saying Congress has allowed the POTUS too much leeway on certain aspects? If so please detail which ones BO plans to have Congress violate for him. There are a lot of moving parts to Article 1/Section 8.

Article I section 8, but so have most of his predecessors since 1930.

Obama simply wants to carry the violations a bit farther.

Hot off of the presses from politico:

Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) on Thursday backed off his firm promise to withdraw combat forces from Iraq immediately and instead said he could “refine” his plan after his trip to Baghdad later this month.

Earlier, a top Obama adviser had said that the senator is not “wedded” to a specific timeline.

Obama told reporters in Fargo, N.D., that he is “going to do a thorough assessment."

"When I go to Iraq and I have a chance to talk to some of the commanders on the ground, I'm sure I'll have more information and will continue to refine my policies," he said, according to CBS News. “I have been consistent, throughout this process, that I believe the war in Iraq was a mistake.”

Obama later said at a second news conference he still intends to stick to the timeline

about the Constitution. Please define for me exactly what parts of the Constitution Obama is proposing to violate. Because I can certainly name many parts that our curent POTUS has certainly ignored/spat upon. As for social programs, that has nothing to do with the Constitution. There are many, many things that are not defined in our Constitution and that is for a reason. It was meant to be a living document and to change as times dictated and approval to do so was met using strict guidelines. The framers also knew they could not predict the future or what needs the nation may require as time passed. Saying the Constitution does not say it so it should not be so is not a good argument.

I believe Obama is promising more of everything that is in violation of our constitution. If the people don't care, so be it. What makes the matter worse, though, is that he is protected from questions that would reveal his true motives. Example: Obama claims to have worked his way through college but some study group cannot find any proof that he ever held any jobs other than political. He avoids interviews that are not biased in his favor. I feel certain there will be more on that to come.

My belief is that ANY campaign “promise” by a presidential candidate relating to healthcare, welfare, and any other social issue is out of line and is not in keeping with the integrity and constitutional function of the office.
I want to know what the candidate intends to do about security. I want to know what the candidate will do about ensuring that each state retains it’s own right to govern.
Both Obama and McCain fail miserably on addressing those issues. I don’t want the President setting up or dictating healthcare or welfare programs. I don’t want my president to manipulate our industry to try to settle the economy. Any time the government gets their grubby little hands into economic issues, it turns into an utter disaster.
You may want the government to be the answer to every little problem, but the Constitution does not provide for that kind of meddling.

I don't follow your logic. We have had very experienced leadership these past eight years, but we have also had the most unpopular executive branch in history, it seems.
So the idea is . . . we just decide to go with someone inexperienced next time??? Looking at all of George Bush's traits, his experience in government is just one of them. Why not get someone who is his polar opposite on all of the other traits, but is nonetheless experienced (state governors tend to have more executive experience than senators and Congressmen). To say we are fed up with the status quo does not imply that we are fed up with electing experienced people. If you don't see the logic here, ask yourself whether we should just get the most inexperienced person we can find--perhaps run a panhandler from Virginia Beach Boulevard for president.
I like Obama. He has some good qualities--I don't count his inexperience as an

Its been tried before and has never worked.

Certainly, if you read Obama's web site, or watch his current TV commercials, he appears pretty middle of the road. Unfortunately, that is entirely in contradiction to his past speeches and votes in the Senate and the Illinois legislature, and even with the rhetoric he used in the primary season. His record is far to the left of the image his handlers are trying to project now.

Apparently, he hopes we have short memories or were not paying attention in the first place. Carter and Clinton both ran as centrists and then governed to the far left, but they fooled people long enough to get elected. Perhaps Obama will as well.

"I cannot see where a Republican administration and a Republican-dominated Congress from 2000-2006 brought progress and prosperity to our citizens, nor brought security. "

This does not prove any experience or capabilities on Obama's behalf. I also think using his website as a source for info can be questionable as well.

How does this stuff get printed?