.(US).. law enforcement can easily get subpoena's to track individual users now. Imagine if the government was IN CONTROL of the internet.
Are you saying that although the US government can gain large amounts information it wants quite easily from private enterprises now - if it became a publicly regulated utility they could gain more? That may be true, but I view it more as a question of political power. My rule of is that those without power tend to suffer. Back in the 60's - when the "Russkies" terrorized our corporate state - It seemed to me that privacy laws were much stronger. That would include publicly regulated utilities.

How do Slashdot people feel about the regulation of political parties in the U.S.? People who tend to oppose government regulation never mention this subject. It doesn't seem to interest them.

Great Quote from 1927
Here in the last generation, a development has taken place which finds an analogy nowhere else. American parties have ceased to be voluntary associations like trade unions or the good government clubs or the churches. They have lost the right freely to determine how candidates shall be nominated and platforms framed, even who shall belong to the party and who shall lead it. The state legislatures have regulated their structure and functions in great detail."

ref What is a Political Party?
http://i-voter.tripod.com/US_PoliticalParties.html

TRIPOD has a free subscription but it doesn't include FTP either. http://www.tripod.lycos.com/web-hosting/compare_plans.pl

Monthly $4.95 Yearly $54.45

Citizen's Political Power in the U.S.

RE: Democracy is a political system. Capitalism, Socialism, and Communism are economic systems.

Whats your point?

Basics first. Are you trying to pretend that you can define Capitalism,or Socialism, or Communism, or whatever "ism" you choose and declare a winner? Words are subjective and ism's are very subjective. I have read so many different definitions that I can't count them. Those with the power make the rules. They tend to create, or modify, an economic system so that it benefits themselves.

It's funny seeing people arguing for either Capitalism or Communism without mentioning democracy.

Emphasizing democracy would mean neither capital (wealth) or a state bureaucracy would be as likely to control the state. The principle would be the well being of the people. Ignoring democracy makes the argument over Capitalism and Communism fairly meaningless.They are both just ways of gaining power over the people.

Perhaps you think the U.S. is a democracy? My subjective answer would be not as much as you might think, and not as much as it once was.

Citizen's Political Power in the U.S. http://i-voter.tripod.com/

But the benefits of becoming more monopolistic will remain.

Cheap Internet $9.95. - Market monopoly priceless!

Corporate Competition:

I demand Zillions for purchasing patents. Not a cent for debt relief and no taxes. This is war and we must be productive to achieve victory!

Citizen's Political Power in the U.S.
http://i-voter.tripod.com/

This concept stems from Adam Smith's book The Wealth of Nations. The original phrase would have been "the invisible hand of the market." Not that Smith actually used the exact phrase.

The point that I would make was that by Adam Smith's time jury nullification was fully accepted and contract law was judged by the people who had the right to sit on a jury. This indicates to me that while the market was, to a significant extent, freer from the State, It was no longer as free from the people.

Note: At this time the only real power the House of Commons had was to tax the commoners, or refuse to do so. The House of Lords had a total veto on all legislation.

To me the use of the term free-market in the U.S. implies that it is free from the people. To put it simply, the government always serves someones interest, and people without power tend to suffer.

If someone believes that words on a piece of paper will defend their rights, they are not a republican or a democrat, they are fools. Only people have the interest to defend political rights that benefit people.

You can not have it both ways. A political system that gives most political power to an an elite will not be defended by those without power. Also, those without power will not help you turn the tide back to the way it was. The powerless may, or may not, be highly educated, but they are not such fools as would put their trust in a piece of paper! I suspect you can see the writing on the wall - to use a vaguely biblical phrase.

Wrong! A republic just means that political rule is not by a hereditary nobility. The franchise was restricted, but people voted for representation. The USA was often described as a democracy. SEE: Tocqueville's, Democracy in America, pub 1835.

Wildly Wrong! In fact we had a great deal more political power than we have now! Those who had the franchise had jury nullification. Jury nullification included the right to judge contracts, speech issues, theft, etc.
The Constitutional Relationship of the People to the Law

RE: per our Constitution, the government is supposed to have little political power as well. That brings up something that I think needs to be more widely understood, although it is not a constitutional issue. It is the effective outlawing of political parties. It gives incumbent politicians much greater power.
What is a Political Party

Mod up. Mod way up!

The vast majority of the U.S. population has little political power compared to most other democratic nations. I wonder if many of the people who promote standing up for "liberty," ever consider the relationship democracy has to "liberty" or "freedom." Are liberty and freedom defined by, and stem from, democratic principles or elite principles? We no longer have any real jury nullification power in the US. The terms liberty and freedom mean nothing. You must explain who has the right to define the laws relating to them.

Politically speaking, if freedom only means "nothing else to lose," then you are fairly free in the U.S. - it could include our large prison population.

Citizen's Political Power in the U.S.

gtall wrote:
their biggest problem is putting up with the American people; the American people believe the worst while refusing to take any responsibility for the state of the country.
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IMO: Making a general statement about the political actions of U.S. citizens without understanding the nature of our political system is not very insightful.
Citizen's Political Power in the U.S.
IMO: Although the pile of democratic nations has been growing, when the ability of U.S. voters to influence their government is considered the U.S. voter is close to the bottom of that pile!

I_Voter
Platforms: From the Voters Perspective

dlevitan wrote:
your only piece of information is from the prosecutor and defense lawyer,

The prosecutor and defense lawyers speech can also be restricted in most states. The purpose is specifically to limit the juries knowledge to what the judiciary considers relevant. This has been considered constitutional since 1895. Prior to that a jury was often addressed as "the Nation." "Will the Nation please rise" was intoned when the judge entered the courtroom. The tension between the judge, who represents the government, and the citizen jury, that represents the people, is obvious.

Background for the function of the Jury in English and U.S. constitutional tradition
The Constitutional Relationship of the People to the Law

Go copponex yes yes yes

RE: Yawn Yawn Yawn

I think that leak about the contents of a July 24 2009 cable, which summarized the assessment of the US embassy in Honduras on key facts that were politically disputed by supporters of the (Honduran) coup regime provides important information to U.S. citizens relating to the actions of our U.S. Executive branch, and is significant. This leak has not been widely covered by the U.S. media probably because it does have political significance for U.S. citizens, as well as the citizen of Central and South America. It is certainly being covered elsewhere.

http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL1012/S00018/wikileaks-honduras-us-busted-on-support-of-coup.htm

SmallFurryCreature wrote:
Democracy ONLY works when the public is well informed

True, but the corollary of this is that limited or ineffectual democracy leads to less support for freedom of speech. The majority below the average income (the poor) will defend speech, as a political issue, as long as they believe the political system benefits them - and no longer.

From the Wikipedia Pentagon Papers page
http://yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1894524&op=Reply&threshold=-1&commentsort=0&mode=thread&pid=34429666 [slashdot.org]

"To ensure the possibility of public debate about the content of the papers, on June 29, US Senator Mike Gravel (then Democrat, Alaska) entered 4,100 pages of the Papers to the record of his Subcommittee on Public Buildings and Grounds."

"Article I, Section 6 of the United States Constitution provides that "for any Speech or Debate in either House, [a Senator or Representative] shall not be questioned in any other Place", thus the Senator could not be prosecuted for anything said on the Senate floor, and, by extension, for anything entered to the Congressional Record, allowing the Papers to be publicly read without threat of a treason trial and conviction. This was confirmed by the Supreme Court in the decision Gravel v. United States."

From the Wikipedia Pentagon Papers page
http://yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1894524&op=Reply&threshold=-1&commentsort=0&mode=thread&pid=34429666

"To ensure the possibility of public debate about the content of the papers, on June 29, US Senator Mike Gravel (then Democrat, Alaska) entered 4,100 pages of the Papers to the record of his Subcommittee on Public Buildings and Grounds."

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IMO The level of free speech in such a limited democracy as the U.S. has always been an anomaly of history. Actually, U.S. free speech is based on money.

The political power of the citizen, or democracy, as in the rule of the people, is always for me - the primary issue. Freedom of speech can never be the primary issue, because limiting freedom of speech is always about controlling the people. Yes, one group of people in a democracy will often limit the speech of others, particularly for national security issues ( ie anti-fascist laws in Germany ), but in the long run free speech is always in the people's interest. The poor will defend speech, as political issue, as long as they believe the political system benefits them - and no longer.