What the Brevity Act tells us about public moods.

Seeing this proposed 28th Amendment to the Constitution from Big Hollywood (H/T: Instapundit):

No law, bill, resolution or any act of Congress shall exceed 2000 words, including all footnotes, amendments and signatures. Congress shall not vote on any item longer than that. Each item requiring a vote shall be read aloud in its entirety in session to a majority of members. Those not in attendance may not vote on the item.

…I’m reminded of this bit from Robert Heinlein’s Expanded Universe.  In one didactic bit, he has a Senator propose something called a ‘Semantic Amendment:’

“It permits a citizen to challenge the Constitutionality of any law or regulation, Federal or any lesser authority, on the grounds that it is ambivalent, equivocal, or cannot be understood by a person of average intelligence. Paragraph two defines ‘average intelligence.’ Paragraph three defines and limits the tests that may be used to test the challenged law. The fourth paragraph excludes law students, law school graduates, lawyers, judges, and uncertified j.p.’s from being test subjects.”

Fascinating to contemplate, no? Also, exceptionally unlikely to happen any time soon. But that’s not precisely the point. The point is that when people start talking about changing the Constitution like this, what they’re really saying is “I’m getting sick and tired of the idiots running things right now.”

Let those in power with eyes to see not see this, and not understand – for they are not of my political party.

Moe Lane

PS: I don’t know: how many people like Bob Gale are out there? Guess we’ll just find out, huh?

Crossposted to RedState.