Our Constitution: Is It A "Living" Constitution??!

Help me out someone, why is it not ok for Bush to circumvent and treat the constitution as a "living" document, yet perfectly acceptable for Obama to do so? This is the single biggest issue for me with Obama. His disreguard for constitutional solidity and gospel. I view the constitution as gospel for the government. It lays very specific reponsabilities and powers, limiting them and with very good reason. It was done to prevent what we were trying to escape when it was written. And here we are now, electing people who are dangerously folling with this ideology and marginalizing the importance of the limits and outlines laid out in the constitution. The constitution is not a document that is changed easily and the only way to do it is by national effort, not by circumventing it through legislation and mis-appointment of judiciary members. If we are able to arbitrarily change the fundmentals of it so easily, how long then untill more important parts of it are eliminated, changed or ignored? Such as the 10th amendment which defines us as a republic, The 1st amendment, which guarantees the free speech and press as well as religion? Or the second amendment, which guarantees the rights of a state to defend itself from over reaching government or developing tyrany? Marginalize this document and you destroy everything we stand for and are as a republic of free states.

xfahctor is correct, the constitution was not meant to be changed easily but it was meant to be changed when necessary and a system was set in place for doing so. Here's a quote from Thomas Jefferson regarding the constitution as a living document: "I am not an advocate for frequent changes in laws and constitutions, but laws and institutions must go hand in hand with the progress of the human mind. As that becomes more developed, more enlightened, as new discoveries are made, new truths discovered and manners and opinions change, with the change of circumstances, institutions must advance also to keep pace with the times."

Sowell is correct. The Constitution is NOT a living document... it is a binding legal document that is the basis of our laws and sets limits as to what the government can do. The fact that 0bama and others don't like what it has to say tells me they have no business in any position of political power.

While it is necessary to add to our constitution to keep up as our society grows and changes, I do not believe that the original substance should be changed. Our constitution represents the ideals of our founding fathers - the guidelines for how our country was formed and what it was meant to be - and those should stand unchanged.

Does it have a pulse? Have a heart beat? Does it actually breath? Well then it is not alive or "living". The constitution is what it is. A document that set down the rules for our country. Plain and simple. No one want to say "hey I want to do away with the constitution". they would never get elected. So they use little tricks like this to justify what they want to. It makes it sound better. Appearances are everything you know.