I don’t want to beleaguer Piers Morgan’s brain, but he might also take note of the fact that much of the existing powers of the government are nowhere spelled out in the Constitution. For starters, the federal government has no expressed powers to regulate airplanes, automobiles, railroads, bus lines, radio and television broadcasting, telephone communication, motion pictures, the recording industry, computers and Internet systems, nuclear energy, and, well, the list is endless. To the wimpish plea that such technologies did not exist at the time of the adoption of the Constitution, the obvious response is that the framers could not have intended congressional authority to extend to the unknown: unless, of course, one is trying to rationalize a system of unlimited power.

The Best of Butler Shaffer