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What do you think about this?

Particularly with regards to the 17th amendment.

I used to think........ I have thought for the longest time that the 16th amendment was the most dangerous amendment.

I’m beginning to think I’m wrong. The 16th is second to the 17th amendment in the danger presented.

The 16th Amendment is definitely the most egregious Amendment. The power of the federal government has been expanding since passage of the 16th Amendment in 1913. It empowered the federal government with a separate court system that presumes a person guilty until proven innocent.

There is a reason why Karl Marx included a heavy progressive tax on income in his Communist Manifesto. Marx understood incrementally increasing the taxation on productivity over time will eventually discourage people from working and consequently will turn to the state for their dependency. This has been happening for the last 97 years. The 16th Amendment has become a means of punishment and control over the people.

Our President, No. 4.

Thanks for the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.

I used to think of Madison as the father of the Constitution. Now I see him as mother. I see Hamilton as the mother%^*...just kidding. I have some contrarian views on the 17th. My general view is that it has made no difference whatsoever. It's a red herring.

It is not the mode of election that gives senators their power and access to corruption, etc. It is the power of the national legislature itself that gives individual senators their power.

Here's where I refer to Antifederalist 39. The following excerpt is from the essays of "A FARMER." It appeared in the Philadelphia Independent Gazetteer on April 15 and 22, 1788:

The State legislatures do not choose senators by legislative or sovereign authority, but by a power of ministerial agency as mere electors or boards of appointment. They have no power to direct the senators how or what duties they shall perform; they have neither power to censure the senators, nor to supersede them for misconduct. It is not the power of choosing to office merely that designates sovereignty, or else corporations who appoint their own officers and make their own by-laws, or the heads of department who choose the officers under them, such as commanders of armies, etc., may be called sovereigns, because they can name men to office whom they cannot dismiss therefrom. The exercise of sovereignty does not consist in choosing masters, such as the senators would be, who, when chosen, would be beyond control, but in the power of dismissing, impeaching, or the like, those to whom authority is delegated. The power of instructing or superseding of delegates to Congress under the existing confederation has never been complained of, although the necessary rotation of members of Congress has often been censured for restraining the state sovereignties too much in the objects of their choice. As well may the electors who are to vote for the president under the new constitution, be said to be vested with the sovereignty, as the State legislatures in the act of choosing senators. The senators are not even dependent on the States for their wages, but in conjunction with the federal representatives establish their own wages. The senators do not vote by States, but as individuals. The representatives also vote as individuals, representing people in a consolidated or national government; they judge upon their own elections, and, with the Senate, have the power of regulating elections in time, place and manner, which is in other words to say, that they have the power of elections absolutely vested in them.
That the State governments have certain ministerial and convenient powers continued to them is not denied, and in the exercise of which they may support, but cannot control the general government, nor protect their own citizens from the exertion of civil or military tyranny-and this ministerial power will continue with the States as long as two- thirds of Congress shall think their agency necessary.

Beck complains of outside financial influence. Isn't the conservative position that political money should flow freely? Many individuals send money to candidates that don't directly represent them. What's the difference?

This is a result of our system, and the way majority party rule works in the legislative branch. Outside interests get involved because the national legislature is a national body performing national functions on a level that the states have no control over. In short, national politicians represent national interests.

Chris Dodd was powerful because of his positions within the Senate, the result of majority party rule. Whoever sits in that chair will be powerful, no matter who elects him. The states can't change that. These guys don't see themselves as representing just their state--and they are correct. They are national legislators.

If the statehouses chose senators, the corruption, instead of flowing directly to and from the senator, would now first have to flow through the statehouse, then to the senator. Seems like an extra layer of graft to me. Cut out the middle man. Unless you think you can have government without graft? Stop it. You're killing me.

There are anti-democratic arguments for the old way. Personally, I think the old way was a fig leaf meant to give a federal appearance to a national system as a means of selling it to the country. I think FARMER is correct that it is window-dressing federalism at best. The result is the same either way. It makes no difference at all.