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13th July 2017, 10:46 AM | #3241 |
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13th July 2017, 10:49 AM | #3242 |
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"A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep." "Ninety percent of the politicians give the other ten percent a bad reputation." |
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13th July 2017, 10:50 AM | #3243 |
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An ex-FBI agent assesses Trump and Russia:
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13th July 2017, 10:50 AM | #3244 |
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And is that understanding based on 52 U.S. Code § 30121? If so, why did you think foreign government involvement was relevant to the legal question? If not, what statute do you base your understanding on?
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"As long as it is admitted that the law may be diverted from its true purpose -- that it may violate property instead of protecting it -- then everyone will want to participate in making the law, either to protect himself against plunder or to use it for plunder. Political questions will always be prejudicial, dominant, and all-absorbing. There will be fighting at the door of the Legislative Palace, and the struggle within will be no less furious." - Bastiat, The Law |
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13th July 2017, 10:52 AM | #3245 |
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Sufficiently advanced Woo is indistinguishable from Parody "There shall be no *poofing* in science" Paul C. Anagnostopoulos Force ***** on reasons back" Ben Franklin |
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13th July 2017, 10:54 AM | #3246 |
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That's not quite my point. They are concerned about whether voting for impeachment will affect their support. Which, ultimately, is what Republicans would be interested in too. Even if Trump is hurting their election prospects, if they won't vote for impeachment if doing so further hurts their prospects. That's the fundamental dynamic in play, with both parties, since the very beginning of the Republic.
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"As long as it is admitted that the law may be diverted from its true purpose -- that it may violate property instead of protecting it -- then everyone will want to participate in making the law, either to protect himself against plunder or to use it for plunder. Political questions will always be prejudicial, dominant, and all-absorbing. There will be fighting at the door of the Legislative Palace, and the struggle within will be no less furious." - Bastiat, The Law |
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13th July 2017, 10:57 AM | #3247 |
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Sufficiently advanced Woo is indistinguishable from Parody "There shall be no *poofing* in science" Paul C. Anagnostopoulos Force ***** on reasons back" Ben Franklin |
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13th July 2017, 11:02 AM | #3248 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Thanks to you and C Felix:
Adding events pertaining to Roger Stone / Podesta: My additions in red
* An hour after pussy-grabbing video released. Unusual activity noticed between Russian bank and Trump server |
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OECD healthcare spending Public/Compulsory Expenditure on healthcare https://data.oecd.org/chart/60Tt Every year since 1990 the US Public healthcare spending has been greater than the UK as a proportion of GDP. More US Tax goes to healthcare than the UK |
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13th July 2017, 11:03 AM | #3249 |
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13th July 2017, 11:05 AM | #3250 |
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In this specific case, that's not really selling out the American people, it's selling out to the American people. It's doing whatever voters want, even if for purely selfish reasons. If the voters are making good choices about what they want, then following the will of the voters will produce good outcomes.
To paraphrase Milton Friedman, you don't get good governance by making sure the right people get elected, you get good governance by making sure whoever get elected has incentive to do the right thing. |
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"As long as it is admitted that the law may be diverted from its true purpose -- that it may violate property instead of protecting it -- then everyone will want to participate in making the law, either to protect himself against plunder or to use it for plunder. Political questions will always be prejudicial, dominant, and all-absorbing. There will be fighting at the door of the Legislative Palace, and the struggle within will be no less furious." - Bastiat, The Law |
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13th July 2017, 11:13 AM | #3251 |
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No, I'm not conflating two things. The relevant interest here is the interest that this specific law advances.
If you can only find a compelling interest which is much narrower than this law covers, then that is not enough constitutional justification for the law (or in this case, a specific interpretation of that law). It will fail because it is too broad. Any speech restriction must be narrowly tailored to the compelling interest, and this law clearly isn't narrowly tailored to your suggested compelling interest. And it doesn't matter if some much narrower hypothetical law might pass constitutional muster, because that's not the law we actually have. |
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"As long as it is admitted that the law may be diverted from its true purpose -- that it may violate property instead of protecting it -- then everyone will want to participate in making the law, either to protect himself against plunder or to use it for plunder. Political questions will always be prejudicial, dominant, and all-absorbing. There will be fighting at the door of the Legislative Palace, and the struggle within will be no less furious." - Bastiat, The Law |
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13th July 2017, 11:15 AM | #3252 |
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Does this mean that the state shouldn't ever try to?
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Why not, if those influences are hostile to the welfare of the state? It would seem to be an imperative that the state do its best to resist such attempts.
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And it seems to be one of those kinds which we are being confronted with in this instance.
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Does this mean that they shouldn't investigate it at all? We are talking about a self-admitted conspiracy between what was believed to be an agent of a foreign power and a Presidential campaign to gain what was believed to be advantageous material for a Federal election. This wasn't "opposition research". That's a transparent joke. No one in the Trump campaign went looking for this. They were approached by a self-identified foreign agent claiming to be a representative of a foreign government and offering them assistance with their campaign efforts. Instead of treating that contact as the potential violation of Federal law that it clearly is and reporting it to the relevant authorities they gleefully pursued the relationship. And, significantly, tried to hide that until it was no longer possible to pretend it didn't happen. They were unquestionably aware that they were doing something they believed they shouldn't be doing. Maybe, in the final regard, it will be determined to not have crossed any lines of culpability. But it is unquestionably dancing close enough to them to merit a formal legal process to determine whether or not it did. Anything less is nothing else but an attempt to erase those lines. Although I suspect you might view that as a good thing. Personally, I don't see it as a good precedent to set. It might be beneficial to the short term interests of the GOP, but I think it would be a bad one for the future integrity of our democratic process. And that has taken enough of a beating already. |
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"A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep." "Ninety percent of the politicians give the other ten percent a bad reputation." |
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13th July 2017, 11:21 AM | #3253 |
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If you're going to make that case, you have to recognize that 54% of 2016 voters wanted somebody other than Trump, and three million more voted for Clinton than Trump. If you say, "but Electoral College....," then you are qualifying your assessment that "the voters" should get what they want. Only some voters in some places, right?
And what actually is "the right thing?" The Trump voters -- the ones who weren't responding to his racist dogwhistles -- believed his specific promises that he would bring industrial jobs back to the U.S., and that he would give everyone better health care at lower prices than they are getting now. Did they ever ask how he would do that, or if even had the capability to do that? Did they really vote to cut Medicaid and lower taxes on the rich? Because that's what they'll get. Sometimes we need our leaders to do the right thing in spite of what voters want, like sending troops to desegregate the schools or supporting the Civil Rights and Voting Rights acts despite LBJ knowing "it will cost us the South" or creating Social Security and Medicare despite cries of socialism and communism. Maybe we need our leaders to do what the next generation of voters will recognize as right. |
13th July 2017, 11:22 AM | #3254 |
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13th July 2017, 11:24 AM | #3255 |
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13th July 2017, 11:25 AM | #3256 |
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I put "any" in there for a reason. Not all influences will be hostile.
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"As long as it is admitted that the law may be diverted from its true purpose -- that it may violate property instead of protecting it -- then everyone will want to participate in making the law, either to protect himself against plunder or to use it for plunder. Political questions will always be prejudicial, dominant, and all-absorbing. There will be fighting at the door of the Legislative Palace, and the struggle within will be no less furious." - Bastiat, The Law |
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13th July 2017, 11:26 AM | #3257 |
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"A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep." "Ninety percent of the politicians give the other ten percent a bad reputation." |
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13th July 2017, 11:28 AM | #3258 |
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"As long as it is admitted that the law may be diverted from its true purpose -- that it may violate property instead of protecting it -- then everyone will want to participate in making the law, either to protect himself against plunder or to use it for plunder. Political questions will always be prejudicial, dominant, and all-absorbing. There will be fighting at the door of the Legislative Palace, and the struggle within will be no less furious." - Bastiat, The Law |
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13th July 2017, 11:32 AM | #3259 |
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13th July 2017, 11:41 AM | #3260 |
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We're not dealing with treason here, though, at last check, given that we're not at war with Russia. Trump Jr's actions may well have been illegal, but fairly certainly do not qualify as treason.
You seem to be arguing under a truly odd misconception here. Meeting with foreign nationals in general, even ones associated with a foreign government, is not being claimed to be illegal. On the other hand, some kinds of interactions with foreign nationals are indeed illegal. When you're fairly consistently arguing as if people were claiming the former, especially when they're clearly trying to discuss the latter, it's hard to take your arguments seriously. By people without the authority to do so and in line with common spying practices? |
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So sayeth the crazy little dragon. |
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13th July 2017, 11:46 AM | #3261 |
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13th July 2017, 11:49 AM | #3262 |
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Your argument is disingenuous to the point of being deliberately obtuse: You left out the most important part of the quote so you could attack a straw man. Here it is again, and if you're not going to address the point, don't just pretend to.
We're not talking about preventing people from spreading dirt on Hillary. Campaigns are not allowed to solicit or accept anything of value from a foreign national, because doing so creates at least the appearance of quid pro quo. In this case, Jr., Kushner, and Manafort certainly knew that the Russians were looking to make a deal in exchange for the in-kind service of oppo research, and your argument that that's not something of value is absurd. That's true even if the dirt was obtained legitimately, but if it turns out that Trump people knew there was illegal activity such as hacking involved, that would be grounds for charging conspiracy to aid and abet that crime. No, but the apparent intent of the actors does, and that will certainly be a factor if anybody gets charged with a crime. And that's not relevant, since soliciting campaign contributions from a foreign national is prohibited, as is conspiring to commit a crime. If Jr.'s lawyer doesn't have a better argument than that, he's toast. And yet you still don't see any "compelling state interest" in throwing the book at Jr., Kushner, and Manafort? |
13th July 2017, 11:53 AM | #3263 |
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This one is completely obvious, really - it doesn't take an ex-FBI agent to tell you this.
*However*, I can say that, for reasons, I suspect this extremely dim view of Toupee Fiasco's behavior in this episode has become very common among the FBI - an FBI that he has already antagonized repeatedly. I'll freely admit that I was initially worried about handing the president to a obvious authoritarian white supremacist. I've been pleased too discover that, at the very least, he's far too stupid to be as effective a force for ...well, evil, when you get down to it... as he could be. So far, he's mostly been effective in kneecapping himself, and in blaming everyone aside from himself. overall, it looks to be about as good as we can hope for, given what a horrible person he is. |
13th July 2017, 11:56 AM | #3264 |
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13th July 2017, 11:56 AM | #3265 |
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The U.S. actually does have a "pecular" definition of "treason". It is the only crime specifically spelled out in the Constitution. In this usage the term "Enemies" is considered to refer to parties which the U.S. is at war with, as suggested by the second clause of the sentence. The "only" is significant and deserves emphasis. The authors of the Constitution were rather sensitive about the looseness with which the concept had been applied in the past in English Common Law, and wanted to be certain that it wasn't quite so cavalierly used here. |
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"A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep." "Ninety percent of the politicians give the other ten percent a bad reputation." |
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13th July 2017, 11:59 AM | #3266 |
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Ridiculous. The US has a very long history of doing everything possible to ensure that foreign powers do not interfere in it's elections - what on earth do you think that whole "natural born citizen" thing in the constitution is about? No court would accept that there's "no compelling interest" here, particularly given that the foreign power involved is a well-known adversary that multiple presidents have already attempted to work with, only to be rebuffed in a fit of Putin's anger and paranoia towards the US.
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13th July 2017, 12:01 PM | #3267 |
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13th July 2017, 12:01 PM | #3268 |
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Firstly, Trump, Jr., Paul Manfort, and Jared Kushner attended a meeting with the intention of illegally colluding with the Russian government and we have his emails as proof. Secondly, their second mistake was to not report their contacts to the FBI and the third mistake were multiple lies to cover-up that meeting. Did they receive "dirt" on Hillary Clinton at that meeting? Well, we can take a look at certain activities and revelations in the days, weeks and months after that meeting to make that determination. |
13th July 2017, 12:08 PM | #3269 |
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I don't think that's the reason for the law, and even if it were, the interpretation being suggested here is still far too broad to serve that purpose, since it applies even in cases where there is no serious possibility of quid pro quo. This is an unconstitutionally broad interpretation of the statute.
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"As long as it is admitted that the law may be diverted from its true purpose -- that it may violate property instead of protecting it -- then everyone will want to participate in making the law, either to protect himself against plunder or to use it for plunder. Political questions will always be prejudicial, dominant, and all-absorbing. There will be fighting at the door of the Legislative Palace, and the struggle within will be no less furious." - Bastiat, The Law |
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13th July 2017, 12:10 PM | #3270 |
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"As long as it is admitted that the law may be diverted from its true purpose -- that it may violate property instead of protecting it -- then everyone will want to participate in making the law, either to protect himself against plunder or to use it for plunder. Political questions will always be prejudicial, dominant, and all-absorbing. There will be fighting at the door of the Legislative Palace, and the struggle within will be no less furious." - Bastiat, The Law |
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13th July 2017, 12:13 PM | #3271 |
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They're proof that they knew the meeting was about obtaining something from the Russians, and they'd be stupid not to expect to have to give something in return. Haven't we established that such an exchange is illegal? Doesn't that make the e-mail proof that it was illegal, since the meeting took place?
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13th July 2017, 12:14 PM | #3272 |
Penultimate Amazing
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Strangely enough, that restriction isn't a restriction on speech.
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"As long as it is admitted that the law may be diverted from its true purpose -- that it may violate property instead of protecting it -- then everyone will want to participate in making the law, either to protect himself against plunder or to use it for plunder. Political questions will always be prejudicial, dominant, and all-absorbing. There will be fighting at the door of the Legislative Palace, and the struggle within will be no less furious." - Bastiat, The Law |
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13th July 2017, 12:17 PM | #3273 |
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"As long as it is admitted that the law may be diverted from its true purpose -- that it may violate property instead of protecting it -- then everyone will want to participate in making the law, either to protect himself against plunder or to use it for plunder. Political questions will always be prejudicial, dominant, and all-absorbing. There will be fighting at the door of the Legislative Palace, and the struggle within will be no less furious." - Bastiat, The Law |
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13th July 2017, 12:20 PM | #3274 |
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Murder isn't mentioned! |
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Eqinsu Ocha! Eqinsu Ocha! |
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13th July 2017, 12:23 PM | #3275 |
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Sounds like you've made sure that nothing of the sort could ever be illegal. No matter if they met, why, or what happened, you'll always find a way to deny that anything wrong happened or that it should be punished or discouraged.
We have a clear statute on this, and direct evidence of intent, but it's not enough because... free speech, apparently. |
13th July 2017, 12:27 PM | #3276 |
Penultimate Amazing
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I continue to be amazed at the extent that republicans are willingly accepting Russia working to get a specific person elected as President.
This well beyond "not the party of Eisenhower" and has reached the level of "not the party of Reagan" Russia's overwhelming support for Trump (irrespective of their work in the election) should have been a huge red flag. As in, "Wait a minute - Russia wants him to be our President? That doesn't sound good." Because communist or not, there's no reason to be thinking that Russia wants what's best for the US. |
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Gunter Haas, the 'leading British expert,' was a graphologist who advised couples, based on their handwriting characteristics, if they were compatible for marriage. I would submit that couples idiotic enough to do this are probably quite suitable for each other. It's nice when stupid people find love. - Ludovic Kennedy |
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13th July 2017, 12:29 PM | #3277 |
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13th July 2017, 12:33 PM | #3278 |
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To survive election season on a skeptics forum, one must understand Hymie-the-Robot.
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13th July 2017, 12:38 PM | #3279 |
Penultimate Amazing
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Yes, I know that. The timeline isn't the problem with that theory, the information itself is. And the alleged information was about Hillary's dealings with Russia. That information would not have been on he Democratic National Committee's servers. So it could not have been obtained from hacking those servers.
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"As long as it is admitted that the law may be diverted from its true purpose -- that it may violate property instead of protecting it -- then everyone will want to participate in making the law, either to protect himself against plunder or to use it for plunder. Political questions will always be prejudicial, dominant, and all-absorbing. There will be fighting at the door of the Legislative Palace, and the struggle within will be no less furious." - Bastiat, The Law |
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13th July 2017, 12:43 PM | #3280 |
Penultimate Amazing
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There are things which could conceivably have happened at the meeting which could be illegal. But it isn't enough to conceive of possible illegal actions. The question is the legality of what we actually have evidence for. We do not, for example, have any evidence that Trump Jr. asked the Russians to murder Hillary. That would certainly be illegal, and despite my opinion of being highly unlikely, it is literally possible.
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"As long as it is admitted that the law may be diverted from its true purpose -- that it may violate property instead of protecting it -- then everyone will want to participate in making the law, either to protect himself against plunder or to use it for plunder. Political questions will always be prejudicial, dominant, and all-absorbing. There will be fighting at the door of the Legislative Palace, and the struggle within will be no less furious." - Bastiat, The Law |
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