"This story is now officially weird as hell."

From "I WAS HAXXORED!" to underage girls, nude photos, and cross-dressing... kinda weird as hell.

i guess if u are boring and normal it might seem "weird"

boogybytes: i guess if u are boring and normal it might seem "weird"



^ fun quote what are we talking about?

A waste water treatment plant dumping sewage into one of the great lakes that is bordered by multiple states is a simple example. Not all pollution is local. The constitution may have been written in the 1780's but that does not mean we should still interpret it like it is the 1780's.

when you pollute the environment in a state it pollutes the entire country's environment to a degree

An obvious example is the pollution of the mississippi river and subsequently the gulf of Mexico. Have you been to a beach in Texas?

besides making everything a state issue isn't standing up for individual rights, it's standing against the common good. If you have solidarity with your neighbors you should have solidarity with your state and your countrymen and the whole world.

That's why libertarians won't ever motivate the base. They intrinsically require a lack of solidarity.

the utter lack of social feeling among so-called libertarians frightens me. i have to ask what kind of society produces people who so adamantly disavow the fundamentally social nature of human life?

Pollution cases involving plaintiffs and defendants in different states can be brought in federal court under the Constitution's diversity of jurisdiction clause. A Federal tax on pollutants I think would be valid under the taxing power. Even if the EPA were declared unconstitutional there would still be Federal involvment in environmental issues.

Pollution isn't commerce and therefore is denied jurisdiction under the interstate commerce clause.

But let's get to the basis of this argument.

As Sam stated, "The constitution may have been written in the 1780's but that does not mean we should still interpret it like it is the 1780's. "

This is just plain wrong. The constitution is a contract between the states. Remember the states were the ones that created the Federal government and the constitution is the chains that they created to unsure the government would not overstep it's bounds and become more powerful then the states.

Contracts are always interpreted using the language and intention of the authors. Changes in definitions of words and other changes in society do not retroactively change the intention of a contract.

@Boogy/BO,

I have no idea what you guys are talking about. Sure pollution effects areas; but you have to make a point. No one is disagreeing with the idea that pollution crosses state boundaries.

Here is laymen example for you; if I hurl garbage onto my neighbors lawn (who happens to be in another state); it isn't the interstate commerce clause that protects my neighbor. It is just plain old laws that existed since the beginning; thus new environmental laws that enable the federal government to get more and more powerful are not protecting your from pollution. In fact; that isn't even their intention; the intention is power; the so called protection is just the marketing used to sell it to the people.

@Skrum,

To clarify; I'm not saying that the federal government should never find itself involved in an environmental case. On the contrary; the federal government's judicial system would be required to adjudicate the cross state polluters that others have mentioned.

So you appear to be agreeing with me, which is good, since I am right.