Monday, I posted 3 Constitutional amendments that I would like to see. Included in one of them was the following section:
Congress shall make no law which embraces more than one subject, that subject to be expressed in the title. All acts which repeal, revive or amend former laws, shll recite in their caption, or otherwise, the title or substance of the law repealed, revived or amended.
As I said then, Congress’ practice of hiding pet projects and pet legislation within the scope of other, higher-profile, and theoretically more popular (or less unapprovable) bills annoys me, and leads to a number of games that Congress ought not be involved in.
The New York Times today provides an example of this:
A bipartisan group of lawmakers announced an agreement on Wednesday to restrict the sales of cold medicines that can be used to manufacture the illegal and highly addictive drug methamphetamine.
Under the proposal, Sudafed and similar medicines would have to be under lock and key in stores. Buyers would have to sign a sheet and show a driver’s license. Purchases would be limited to one box a day and three boxes a month.
The legislation is attached to the renewal of the USA Patriot Act, which passed in the House on Wednesday but whose prospects in the Senate are uncertain.
I don’t necessarily think an anti-meth law is necessarily a bad thing, even though it does create an annoying hassle to get meds with which to treat a sniffle.
If you’ve been reading this blog and my LJ for a while, you can probably guess what I think of the Patriot Act — I don’t mind giving law enforcement and security forces the tools they need to do their job, but I do want controls over potential abuses, either by judicial oversight or by time-limiting practices needed in an extraordinary situation. My dislike of the Patriot Act reauthorization as-is is irrelevant to this particular matter however.
Incorporating an anti-meth bill as part of the Patriot Act? Come on, now! If both items are worthwhile legislation, let them stand on their own merits!
3 responses so far ↓
1 jgfellow // 16 Dec 2005 at 9:02 am
Here, here. What Congress needs is more fellows and fewer esquires.
P.S. I’m enjoying your blog, especially the posts on Bowler vs. Reilly.
-jgfellow.
2 Vincent Herr // 11 Sep 2006 at 4:09 pm
You have built a very nice looking professional grade website. My sister Berta http://www.bertaroebuck.com/ keeps telling me that css is the key. From one actuary to another, can you point me to any website which may present the most direct path to learning css?
What is a moderate liberal Republican? I’m curious whether moderates really exist, and can detect no difference between your commentary and that of an ordinary Democrat. I’ve enjoyed visiting to Connecticut. Someone told me it was mostly concrete, so I was curious to see it, but fairly soon after arriving I noticed this was an ugly lie. CT being a most beautiful country with very upward standards of living, it is understandable why y’all turn into liberals, out of the natural guilt of enjoying life there so much. I don’t blame you really. I tried to get work up there a couple times, but they wouldn’t have me. Never thought I’d become a Texan actually, but it can sneak up and grow on you. Besides, both times I sobered up it was in Texas, so I should probably stay here.
Vincent Herr,
Immoderate Republican Southern Baptist Actuary, Houston Texas
3 MikeTheActuary // 13 Sep 2006 at 1:05 pm
Regarding CSS — The best thing that I can recommend is to learn by example. The graphic theme I’m using here was based on a WordPress theme called “Connections”. I looked at the files, figured out what fit together how by experimentation, and adapted from there.
Regarding my political self-identification — If the Democrats held both houses of Congress and the White House, I’d probably be sounding like a Republican. I’m for efficient government, pro-business within reason, pro-free market, fiscally mostly conservative, socially rather liberal. As near as I can tell, that either makes me a very watered down libertarian, or in a subset of moderate/progressive Republicans that existed a few decades ago.