4 ms·

One does not send Kurt Gödel to do this. He had to be coached during his citizenship test. “1947, he took the test to become a U.S. citizen, sponsored by Einste

One does not send Kurt Gödel to do this. He had to be coached during his citizenship test. “1947, he took the test to become a U.S. citizen, sponsored by Einstein and their mutual friend, the economist Oskar Morgenstern. When he appeared before the judge, after answering the first questions satisfactorily, he told the judge that he had analyzed the U.S. Constitution and that it had a drafting problem, which allowed the U.S. to legally become a dictatorship or a fascist state, as had happened in Austria. Gödel’s two friends were horrified because they saw that his citizenship was in jeopardy, and he could be deported to Europe. The judge himself stopped Gödel by uttering the pragmatic phrase “Oh God, let’s not get into this” and ending the examination before the logician could say anything more.” [1] https://english.elpais.com/science-tech/2023-07-01/kurt-godel-and-the-us-constitutions-loophole.html?outputType=amp https://english.elpais.com/science-tech/2023-07-01/kurt-gode...

aspenmayer 2y ago
I wonder if this may be related to FDR serving four terms as President. If he hadn’t died in office, and had term limits not been implemented in 1951, he may have had even more terms than that. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franklin_D._Roosevelt https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franklin_D._Roosevelt https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twenty-second_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twenty-second_Amendment_to_the...
- jmcqk6 2y ago
  My understanding is that the "flaw" was that it allows itself to be modified via the amendment process. Given his connection to self-referential problems, this makes sense.
  - pavlov 2y ago
    Ironically the real problem with the U.S. constitution is that it’s much too hard to modify. The text is arcane and vague and often meaningless in a modern context, so courts can make up any interpretation they prefer. Does the constitution contain a right to privacy that allows abortion? It did for 50 years, then it suddenly didn’t. What’s a “well-regulated militia”? Anything that a particular court wants it to be. What about “emoluments”? Same. Instead of trying to squeeze new meaning out of 18th century vocabulary, a constitution should rather have a self-destruct clause. Rewrite it completely every fifty years or so. There are nations that do this kind of constitutional reset when times are good (e.g. Finland whose latest constitution is from 2000), and they seem stronger for it. Of course this is not possible in America also because culturally the constitution is much closer to scripture than to ordinary law. The Puritan heritage is in plain sight in how a legal text is treated like Moses had brought it down from the mountain.
    - readthenotes1 2y ago
      "There are nations that do this kind of constitutional reset when times are good (e.g. Finland whose latest constitution is from 2000), and they seem stronger for it." Don't nations do it when times are good for the current regime, often to get rid of term limits?
  - cyberax 2y ago
    Mr. Trump helpfully pointed out another flaw: a president can pardon whoever they want, including themselves. So it's apparently legal for Mr. Biden to send a team to assassinate all his political rivals and then just pardon them.
    - chuckadams 2y ago
      Legal thinking these days is that self-pardons are meaningless, but the fact remains that the party will march so much in lockstep that there are no consequences anyway.
      - aspenmayer 2y ago
        Nixon apparently considered pardoning himself: The Pardon of President Nixon: Annotated https://daily.jstor.org/the-pardon-of-president-nixon-annotated/ https://daily.jstor.org/the-pardon-of-president-nixon-annota... > Nixon had considered pardoning himself while in office[0], and sought a legal opinion considering the constitutionality of doing so (his lawyers believed that it was constitutional). However, three days before his resignation, the Justice Department issued its own opinion to the contrary: “Under the fundamental rule that no one may be a judge in his own case, the President cannot pardon himself.”[1] [0] Pardon Me?: The Constitutional Case against Presidential Self-Pardons https://www.jstor.org/stable/797310 https://www.jstor.org/stable/797310 [1] https://www.justice.gov/sites/default/files/olc/opinions/1974/08/31/op-olc-supp-v001-p0370_0.pdf https://www.justice.gov/sites/default/files/olc/opinions/197... In the context of Trump: Explaining the presidential self-pardon debate https://constitutioncenter.org/blog/explaining-the-presidential-self-pardon-debate https://constitutioncenter.org/blog/explaining-the-president... > On Monday, June 4, 2018, President Donald Trump said on Twitter that, “As has been stated by numerous legal scholars, I have the absolute right to PARDON myself, but why would I do that when I have done nothing wrong?”[2] His comments echoed those made by Rudy Giuliani, his attorney, on Sunday. > Here is a brief explanation of the President’s clemency powers, some past cases, and a theoretical look at a Nixon-era question: Can a President pardon himself or herself? [2] https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1003616210922147841 https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/10036162109221478...
    - 2y ago
- mindslight 2y ago
  What Gödel was talking about is apparent when you look at the style of logical contradiction he is known for. The US Constitution and its Bill of Rights only define rights in terms of narrowly specific negative prohibitions on what the nominal government can do, rather than positive statements of what the People should be able to do. This leaves the door open for extraconstitutional de facto government to exist along side the nominal government - not explicitly authorized by the Constitution, but also not prohibited or constrained by it. We see the resulting shape basically everywhere today, whereby most of the rights laid out in the Bill of Rights have been effectively neutered whether by the government sidestepping the Constitution's specific proscriptions, corporations exercising coercive power based on market share, or the potent combination of both.
  - Apocryphon 2y ago
    Interesting take. Libertarians, who are usually the ones most preoccupied with finding tyranny in any government action (or any government at all), tend to be big fans of negative rights as opposed to positive rights. But that's probably because they're coming from a different ideological outlook.
    - kaba0 2y ago
      Libertarians are not known for their strong logical arguments.
    - mindslight 2y ago
      Yes, "it's just another system of control". I used to partial to big-L Libertarianism. I'm not any more, mostly due to this flaw in the framing and the resulting conclusions. It essentially blesses corporations' extraconstitutional governing, by simply defining away the coercion (plus a healthy dose of ignoring that a "corporation" is itself a government creation). Then offers up individualist fundamentalism to cope with its glaring failings. (These days I identify as small-l "libertarian" because I still believe individual freedom is paramount. And it still puts me in the appropriate "other-weird" bucket with most people, rather than their friendly-kool-aid or other-enemy buckets).
- Apocryphon 2y ago
  That's not really the problem. Yes, FDR broke the tradition, but he was the one exception who broke the rule, and there were plenty of mechanics to prevent him from retaining office if the electorate truly didn't want him.
hi-v-rocknroll 2y ago
It's already clear who will most likely be POTUS on January 20, 2025, so it will be tested. https://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/kurt-godels-loophole-and-donald-trumps-defiance https://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/kurt-godels-loo...

aspenmayer 2y ago

I wonder if this may be related to FDR serving four terms as President. If he hadn’t died in office, and had term limits not been implemented in 1951, he may have had even more terms than that. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franklin_D._Roosevelt https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franklin_D._Roosevelt https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twenty-second_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twenty-second_Amendment_to_the...

jmcqk6 2y ago
My understanding is that the "flaw" was that it allows itself to be modified via the amendment process. Given his connection to self-referential problems, this makes sense.
- pavlov 2y ago
  Ironically the real problem with the U.S. constitution is that it’s much too hard to modify. The text is arcane and vague and often meaningless in a modern context, so courts can make up any interpretation they prefer. Does the constitution contain a right to privacy that allows abortion? It did for 50 years, then it suddenly didn’t. What’s a “well-regulated militia”? Anything that a particular court wants it to be. What about “emoluments”? Same. Instead of trying to squeeze new meaning out of 18th century vocabulary, a constitution should rather have a self-destruct clause. Rewrite it completely every fifty years or so. There are nations that do this kind of constitutional reset when times are good (e.g. Finland whose latest constitution is from 2000), and they seem stronger for it. Of course this is not possible in America also because culturally the constitution is much closer to scripture than to ordinary law. The Puritan heritage is in plain sight in how a legal text is treated like Moses had brought it down from the mountain.
  - readthenotes1 2y ago
    "There are nations that do this kind of constitutional reset when times are good (e.g. Finland whose latest constitution is from 2000), and they seem stronger for it." Don't nations do it when times are good for the current regime, often to get rid of term limits?
- cyberax 2y ago
  Mr. Trump helpfully pointed out another flaw: a president can pardon whoever they want, including themselves. So it's apparently legal for Mr. Biden to send a team to assassinate all his political rivals and then just pardon them.
  - chuckadams 2y ago
    Legal thinking these days is that self-pardons are meaningless, but the fact remains that the party will march so much in lockstep that there are no consequences anyway.
    - aspenmayer 2y ago
      Nixon apparently considered pardoning himself: The Pardon of President Nixon: Annotated https://daily.jstor.org/the-pardon-of-president-nixon-annotated/ https://daily.jstor.org/the-pardon-of-president-nixon-annota... > Nixon had considered pardoning himself while in office[0], and sought a legal opinion considering the constitutionality of doing so (his lawyers believed that it was constitutional). However, three days before his resignation, the Justice Department issued its own opinion to the contrary: “Under the fundamental rule that no one may be a judge in his own case, the President cannot pardon himself.”[1] [0] Pardon Me?: The Constitutional Case against Presidential Self-Pardons https://www.jstor.org/stable/797310 https://www.jstor.org/stable/797310 [1] https://www.justice.gov/sites/default/files/olc/opinions/1974/08/31/op-olc-supp-v001-p0370_0.pdf https://www.justice.gov/sites/default/files/olc/opinions/197... In the context of Trump: Explaining the presidential self-pardon debate https://constitutioncenter.org/blog/explaining-the-presidential-self-pardon-debate https://constitutioncenter.org/blog/explaining-the-president... > On Monday, June 4, 2018, President Donald Trump said on Twitter that, “As has been stated by numerous legal scholars, I have the absolute right to PARDON myself, but why would I do that when I have done nothing wrong?”[2] His comments echoed those made by Rudy Giuliani, his attorney, on Sunday. > Here is a brief explanation of the President’s clemency powers, some past cases, and a theoretical look at a Nixon-era question: Can a President pardon himself or herself? [2] https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1003616210922147841 https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/10036162109221478...
  - 2y ago
mindslight 2y ago
What Gödel was talking about is apparent when you look at the style of logical contradiction he is known for. The US Constitution and its Bill of Rights only define rights in terms of narrowly specific negative prohibitions on what the nominal government can do, rather than positive statements of what the People should be able to do. This leaves the door open for extraconstitutional de facto government to exist along side the nominal government - not explicitly authorized by the Constitution, but also not prohibited or constrained by it. We see the resulting shape basically everywhere today, whereby most of the rights laid out in the Bill of Rights have been effectively neutered whether by the government sidestepping the Constitution's specific proscriptions, corporations exercising coercive power based on market share, or the potent combination of both.
- Apocryphon 2y ago
  Interesting take. Libertarians, who are usually the ones most preoccupied with finding tyranny in any government action (or any government at all), tend to be big fans of negative rights as opposed to positive rights. But that's probably because they're coming from a different ideological outlook.
  - kaba0 2y ago
    Libertarians are not known for their strong logical arguments.
  - mindslight 2y ago
    Yes, "it's just another system of control". I used to partial to big-L Libertarianism. I'm not any more, mostly due to this flaw in the framing and the resulting conclusions. It essentially blesses corporations' extraconstitutional governing, by simply defining away the coercion (plus a healthy dose of ignoring that a "corporation" is itself a government creation). Then offers up individualist fundamentalism to cope with its glaring failings. (These days I identify as small-l "libertarian" because I still believe individual freedom is paramount. And it still puts me in the appropriate "other-weird" bucket with most people, rather than their friendly-kool-aid or other-enemy buckets).
Apocryphon 2y ago
That's not really the problem. Yes, FDR broke the tradition, but he was the one exception who broke the rule, and there were plenty of mechanics to prevent him from retaining office if the electorate truly didn't want him.

hi-v-rocknroll 2y ago

It's already clear who will most likely be POTUS on January 20, 2025, so it will be tested. https://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/kurt-godels-loophole-and-donald-trumps-defiance https://www.newyorker.com/news/daily-comment/kurt-godels-loo...