Baby, Let's Play House

Some weirdo, called Elvis recorded this later and made it quite famous, but that doesn't change that it is a great song:

Arthur Gunter - Baby, Let's Play House

The Washington police searched the offices of a Democratic representative. The NY Times rightfully condemnes this.

I really think it is scary how much power the current administration has amassed in the institutional power triangle. Historically, the fathers of the constitution (for references check the Federalist Papers) interestingly enough wanted to guard against a legislative branch of the government that would obtain too much power. For that reason they not only split up that branch into the rash and populistic House and the deliberative, wise Senate (modeled on the Roman Senate initially), but also they made sure that in the system of checks and balances they created the executive was made stronger because they assumed it to be inherently weaker by nature.

Obviously they could not foresee that this would change in the 20th century (as much as I like FDR, he definitly is to blame for this), yet out of today's perspective the assessment that the legislative branch is the most dangerous one simply seems ludicrous. This then leaves us (the Americans and the world too I guess) with a problem, we have one branch of government which is stronger than the other two AND made additionaly stronger by the constitution. With the exception of France really there is no democratic country that relies so heavily on one branch (or should I say: one man?) of its government to guide the way.

Truth to be told, Bush has done a good job of highlighting this problem even further, yet this is a historic development the only person who weakened it some was Nixon because of the backlash which he produced. This is really dangerous I believe. I've said this before (maybe not on here, but elsewhere), the American constitution definitly needs revising, the balance of power as thought up by Montesquieu and put down in one of the most important democratic documents of all times is in serious peril the way it is handled right now.

Damn, do I sound serious there, really does seem like a dangerous development though, the 20th century abounds with examples of what happens when the executive branch amasses too much power.

On a lighter note, die Süddeutsche Zeitung veranschaulicht, warum ich als wahrer Gentleman eben kein Fußball, sondern Basketball spiele.

Et oui, j'ai commencé cherché pour un colocation à Paris enfin. Vraiment, ca c'est pas facile, si vous connaissez quelqu'un là, qui cherche pour un coloc sympa, intelligent et modeste... dis moi.