A chance to affect change - Iceland is drafting a new constitution

[hazek]

Icelanders vote for ordinary people to draft constitution (http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/rest-of-world/Icelanders-vote-for-ordinary-people-to-draft-constitution/articleshow/7002961.cms#ixzz179wY2qJp)

Just imagine if we could get a few of our Mises.org people to help educate them and help them draft a constitution that would give them a republic governed by law and sound money what that could mean for the world.

What do you think?

[Madly_Sane]

Should draft a constitution that says any government formed in Iceland is unconstitutional, any type of monopoly is unconstitutional, including security (such as police). :rolleyes:

[mconder]

Icelanders vote for ordinary people to draft constitution (http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/rest-of-world/Icelanders-vote-for-ordinary-people-to-draft-constitution/articleshow/7002961.cms#ixzz179wY2qJp)

Just imagine if we could get a few of our Mises.org people to help educate them and help them draft a constitution that would give them a republic governed by law and sound money what that could mean for the world.

What do you think?

I doubt there is a natural rights paradigm for anyone who will have a hand in this. Without that, there is no foundation for government that favors individual liberty. The outcome will be completely arbitrary, unless there is a firm foundation in freedom based ideology to build from.

[fisharmor]

I doubt there is a natural rights paradigm for anyone who will have a hand in this. Without that, there is no foundation for government that favors individual liberty. The outcome will be completely arbitrary, unless there is a firm foundation in freedom based ideology to build from.

I dunno, if they looked back 800-900 years, it would be a serious step in the right direction, even without a stated natural rights foundation.

[thasre]

Well, isn't Iceland the country that the Mises folks like to tout as having had an anarcho-capitalist society in the Middle Ages? Maybe they'd be willing to take up their old system...

[Working Poor]

I wish the people in our country woud stand up to the bankers and their government the way the people in Iceland have.

[tangent4ronpaul]

We could "fix" our Constitution and send it to them as a suggestion...
strike commerce clause, or at least define it's limits tightly.
strike the general welfare clause
term limits
polly party system
ability to impeach / recall senators/reps
no central bank - currency based on gold and silver
no corporate personhood
bills must be on a single issue and no longer than X
prison terms for voting on anything not in the governments enumerated powers
no federal funding of states

Can anyone add to that list?

-t

[eqcitizen]

We could "fix" our Constitution and send it to them as a suggestion...
strike commerce clause, or at least define it's limits tightly.
strike the general welfare clause
term limits
polly party system
ability to impeach / recall senators/reps
no central bank - currency based on gold and silver
no corporate personhood
bills must be on a single issue and no longer than X
prison terms for voting on anything not in the governments enumerated powers
no federal funding of states

Can anyone add to that list?

-t

Also add the supremacy clause to the chopping block, clearly define arms and guns as rights

[hazek]

We could "fix" our Constitution and send it to them as a suggestion...
strike commerce clause, or at least define it's limits tightly.
strike the general welfare clause
term limits
polly party system
ability to impeach / recall senators/reps
no central bank - currency based on gold and silver
no corporate personhood
bills must be on a single issue and no longer than X
prison terms for voting on anything not in the governments enumerated powers
no federal funding of states

Can anyone add to that list?

-t
Also add the supremacy clause to the chopping block, clearly define arms and guns as rights

Oh man if they actually adopted it, I'd move there in a heart beat :)

[sailingaway]

I'd be tempted to send them ours with some clarifications along the lines of 'yes, this language REALLY MEANS THAT in the sections requiring gold or silver as money, and in the ninth and tenth amendments.

[Pericles]

Why not? We're not using it.

[Acala]

We could "fix" our Constitution and send it to them as a suggestion...
strike commerce clause, or at least define it's limits tightly.
strike the general welfare clause
term limits
polly party system
ability to impeach / recall senators/reps
no central bank - currency based on gold and silver
no corporate personhood
bills must be on a single issue and no longer than X
prison terms for voting on anything not in the governments enumerated powers
no federal funding of states

Can anyone add to that list?

-t

The absolute right to peaceful secession at every level down to the household.

[sailingaway]

Why not? We're not using it.

LOL!

Too sad, but funny.

[tangent4ronpaul]

members of congress must obey the same laws we do. no more insider trading or not having to get groped or pornoscanned.

The redress of grievances thing - they have uniformly ignored it.

Involve third parties in debates.

Make Congress spend 90% of their time going through the Congressional record and nullify any law or regulation that is unconstitutional.

-t

[tangent4ronpaul]

maybe we could take this and do what Iceland did with the Wikileaks Law. That started out by Assange mentioning the idea on National TV right agter a huge bank had put a gag order on the state TV station. Perfect timing.

We've got a bunch of tea party candidates that got elected by agreeing to follow the Constitution, so the idea of fixing the government and country should be popular with them and with the public...

http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/06/17/victory-for-wikileaks-in-icelands-parliament/

Victory for WikiLeaks in Iceland’s Parliament

At 4 a.m. on Thursday, at the end of an all-night session, Iceland’s Parliament, the Althing, voted unanimously in favor of a package of legislation aimed at making the country a haven for freedom of expression by offering legal protection to whistle-blower Web sites like WikiLeaks, which helped to craft the proposal.

As the Web site Ice News reports, “One of the inspirations for the proposal was the dramatic August 2009 gagging of of Iceland’s national broadcaster, RUV by Iceland’s then largest bank, Kaupthing.”

One of the sponsors of the proposal in the Althing, Birgitta Jonsdottir, told my colleague Noam Cohen in February that Iceland hoped to become “the inverse of a tax haven,” by offering journalists and publishers some of the most aggressive protections for free speech and investigative journalism in the world. “They are trying to make everything opaque,” she said. “We are trying to make it transparent.”

As Mr. Cohen explained in an article on the package of laws that passed on Thursday:

The proposal, the Icelandic Modern Media Initiative, combines in a single piece of legislation provisions from around the world: whistle-blower laws and rules about Internet providers from the United States; source protection laws from Belgium; freedom of information laws from Estonia and Scotland, among others; and New York State’s law to counteract “libel tourism,” the practice of suing in courts, like Britain’s, where journalists have the hardest time prevailing. [...]

-t

[hazek]

It's exactly what I had in mind.

I mean here's a country which seemingly seems to be open to the ideas of freedom and transparency and they are drafting a new constitution.. It's almost like one in a lifetime chance for a modern day republic amongst a bunch of democracies and oligarchies.

We just need one of the mises.org people to go there and see if they could hold a lecture or something.

[tangent4ronpaul]

Well that, but I was hoping we could write something up, get a bunch of people to sign onto it and then see if we could get some of the tea party candidates that won to introduce it as a bill. Most of it would probably get shot down, but the discussion and news coverage could spark a brushfire in this country - and I'm thinking something that would pay returns in 2012.

there are a lot of issues that are hot button ones, like the mandatory buy in to insurance and the patriot act. Point out they are all unconstitutional and this is a way to fix them. It could snowball.

-t

[sratiug]

I don't hink Iceland has states. So you'd be writing a state constitution that would be very different from our federal constitution.

[tangent4ronpaul]

Think you're right:

Administrative divisions:
Field info displayed for all countries in alpha order.
8 regions; Austurland, Hofudhborgarsvaedhi, Nordhurland Eystra, Nordhurland Vestra, Sudhurland, Sudhurnes, Vestfirdhir, Vesturland

but no listed gvmt in those regions.

https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/ic.html