Posted on 06/09/2004 7:11:35 PM PDT by Coleus
Only far enough to prevent screwing up other people's rights and liberties or causing a clear and present danger of screwing up other people's rights and liberties. Taking non-fraudulently marketed and labelled nutritional supplements doesn't screw up other people's rights and liberties or cause a clear and present danger of screwing up other people's rights and liberties; so taking non-fraudulently marketed and labelled nutritional supplements is not legitimate for a government to restrict.
The proper course would be to first give them a chance to retract those claims; if they don't, ban them.
You are still missing the point. If the POWER to regulate is not explicitly given to the government in the Constitution, then they cannot arbitrarily grab that power. As no such power exists at the federal level, ie; the US Constitution, then that power cannot exercised by the FedGov. Period. Just setting up a Food and Drug Administration, absent the requisite Constitutional amendment, is not strictly LEGAL, no matter what the precieved benefits may be.
Judging from the FDA's performance so far, even derrived benefit is in question.
Problem is if taking vitamins is a RIGHT (which cannot be restricted) instead of a LIBERTY (which can) then the government cannot legimately enforce any level of quality standard on the vitamin industry. By restricting the manufacturing and sale they would be interfering with the consumption which would be a violation of people's rights. Only if consuming vitamins is downgraded to a liberty is the government free to weed fraud out of the industry.
And that's why it's important to not call liberties rights, when you do so you either raise something to a height it doesn't deserve, or you weaken the concept of rights to the point that they CAN be limited by the government. Neither is a good thing.
There you go. You just downgraded vitamins from a right to a liberty.
Fine by me.
Say, can you name any of these rights that government can't restrict or limit in any degree? I can't think of any.
No I'm not missing the point. I've said over and over and over and over that this is NOT a legitimate thing for the FED. But just because it's not legitimate for he fed doesn't mean it's not legitimate for some other level of government. The only one missing a point here is YOU who keep insisting people are saying something they're not. Regulation of the industry WILL happen, it should happen at the state level, that's EXACTLY what I said. Then you went off on some absolutist rant about all regulatio being banning, now you're trying to defend that by running back to it being outside the limitations of the fed. But I didn't saythe fed should be the one doing, in fact I said the federal agency that would wind up in charge of it was illegitimate.
Read the WHOLE POST and DON'T INSERT your own garbage. Every single time in this discussion you've inserted something into what I've said what you've inserted is the exact opposite of what I'm saying. I said all the way back in post 49 that this wasn't legitimate for the fed and her eyou are in 243 still insisting that I'm supporting the fed in this! STOP INSERTING THINGS INTO MY ARGUMENT!
Of course.
1 2 3 4 and 5... at least when things are behaving properly. 1 gets some issues because opposing sides occasionally require some refereeing, but that's why 1 doesn't include time, location and audience.
So, I have a vested interest in purchasing them...If you want to criticize a racket go after the AMA.
When it comes to our Rights, liberties, and freedoms... why are you NOT an absolutist?
I've made plenty of cogent arguments. You just keep moving my position to being pro-Fed which renders them all invalid. If you read what I actually wrote and see that the only regulation I'm calling for would be at the state level or even below that it all makes sense.
Problem with going after them on the basis of fraud is they use the disclaimer. Since they technically don't promise anything they aren't making any fraudulent promises. You can get them on faulty so at least they can't put anything harmful to everybody in there. But since most of those pills are made from various bean extracts people with food allergies need to watch out.
I'm not an absolutist about anything because absolutism removes the opportunity to think. We are thinking creatures for a reason, so that we can understand there are exceptions to every rule, so we can comprehend how some regulations are actually helpful and within the legitimate powers of government at certain level. There simply are no absolutes in this world, and attempts to make things absolute result in the creation of mental constructs that cannot survive in the wild.
Hhhmmm... could it be because the legislation in question at the top of thread is a FEDERAL effort? Be that as it may, how many States have Constitutional provisions for dietary supplement regulation?
So, you are a moral relativist. How liberal of you. Not suprising though I guess. Yes, we are reasoning beings. Sentience is our one true gift that rises us above animals. Also note, that while there are exceptions to every rule, you are the one advocating more rules. Not me. I advocate a harsh penalty for actual damage, not some arbitrary "regulation" that prevents no real harm and only creates more bureacracy.
You are alive. Or Dead. I either I hit you in the head with a rock, or I do not. There are all KINDS of absolutes in the world. Not having absolutes allows for intellectually dishonest people to argue the definition of a word like "is" and if oral sex is indeed sex.
Hmm could it be that I've said over a dozen times in this thread, sometime in posts directed to YOU, that the legislation in question at the top of the thread is invalid and should be blocked and grounds of being outside the limitations put on the fed by the Constitution?! As matter of fact yes that IS THE CASE, all the way back in post 49 and many times since then.
I think thanks to the FDA most states have given up on making any of their own regulation involving medication at any level.
I'm not a moral relativist, and stop with the insults. I just understand that absolute positions lead to absolute stupidity. If you absolutely positively will not kill then you cannot defend yourself or your family. These things are called ethical quandries, they require thinking and consideration and the disgarding of absolute ideas that restrict both. That's not moral relativism and it's not liberal, it's moral understanding and very conservative.
Yes more rules can be called for. New things get invented that pose new challenges to our society and we must think of how we're going to handle it. Though I haven't actually called for anything, I've simply pointed out that the suppliment industry will be regulated eventually, and it will. Now the question is do we want to respect the Constitution and regulate it at levels below the federal government or not respect it and give it to the pathetic FDA? And do we want to consider how we'll regulate keeping in mind that we aren't trying to kill the industry only the snake oil salemen that use it as a cover, or will we go off in some craze of mass restriction? You see these are questions an absolutist cannot contemplate, his absolute thought process rebels at realizing that some rules can be necessary and it is possible to write good rules.
Ah but you can be dieing, almost dead but not yet. Then there's the question of soul and if any part of you survives bodily death. Did you hit me with the rock with a full on blow or was it merely grazing, or perhaps you caught my hair and though you hit me with a rock but actually didn't. Absolutes are incredibly rare, not making them where they don't exist allows you to actually use the mind that God gave you. And the sick sad truth is "is" isn't as concrete a word as we'd like ( http://www.m-w.com/cgi-bin/dictionary?book=Dictionary&va=is&x=0&y=0 ).
To: ColeusSupplements are food.
I have a right to use vitamins?! The fact that this group is adding yet another imaginary right is good enough reason not to sign.
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Yes, "eating" is a Right.
Supplements aren't food, they're "supplements" stuff that by their very name says you don't have to have them to live. A significant percentage of them are placebos and complete junk. The ones that aren't complete junk still can be lived without. And even if they were food, you don't have a right to a specific type of food. Eating is a right, eating filet mignon is not.
I'm not an absolutist about anything because absolutism removes the opportunity to think.
We are thinking creatures for a reason, so that we can understand there are exceptions to every rule, -- so we can comprehend how some regulations are actually helpful and within the legitimate powers of government at certain level. There simply are no absolutes in this world, and attempts to make things absolute result in the creation of mental constructs that cannot survive in the wild.
254 dicostu
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It's hopeless DC..
We've got a person here arguing an absolutist position that 'everything is relative' when it comes to government violating our individual rights.
Discostu, in 1776 'We the People' declared that governments could no longer infringe upon our rights to life, or to liberty, or to property.
In 1868, after a bloody civil war, -- we reiterated that same principle in ratifying the 14th Amendment.
Now we again find ourselves in another 'war', a war against ALL levels of our own government, who ~insist~ that they be allowed to over-regulate, even ban, certain aspects of our rights to life, liberty, & property.
You have taken the position that governments can ban vitamins.. - This is a fact that anyone can verify by reading your posts.
-- Deal with that fact.
Almost but not quite. Whatever you want to do to and by yourself is your RIGHT, as you own your own body and may do with it as you please, asking the permission of NO ONE. When you start to deal with others is where things can get sticky. You do, for example, have the RIGHT to offer your time and skills in return for the means to sustain your life (food, shelter, etc...) but no one else can be COMPELLED to accept your offer or provide the necessities of life to you against their will. This is where the problem lies, for the left has, indeed, perverted the word "RIGHT" to mean that if you want to demand something, ANOTHER PERSON must be compelled at the point of the government's guns, to provide the means of filling your wants and wishes. RIGHTS comprise anything you want to do that does NOT require someone else's efforts to fulfill. You are at liberty to ASK someone for a handout. That person is well within his RIGHTS to tell you to go pound salt.
Therein is the difference, which you are slow to grasp. Do it by yourself, to yourself, with no INVOLUNTARY input from another... it's a RIGHT. Try to initiate any sort of force whatsoever to get something from another person: you should be boiled in oil. Attempt to use the force of government as your proxy, you should suffer the fate of Nick Berg, only slower. You own YOUR body, do as you will. However, I own MY body so if you want something from me, best you ask real nice. Initiate any sort of force (including fraud, trickery, etc.) to get what is MY justly acquired property and prepare to die horribly (in a JUST society, anyway).
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