Reason show notes for January 27, 2009

In hour one, I talked about a plan by Wisconsin Senator Russ Feingold to make sure all US Senators are directly elected by the people.

While most people would call that a WIN, I disagree. I'd actually prefer that all US Senators are either appointed by the governor of that state or (preferably) elected by the legislative branch of that state as was the case prior to the passage of the 17th Amendment.

In other words, Feingold wants to add an amendment to the Constitution. I want to remove one. I'm not alone, though. If you read down through the 17th Amendment link above, you will see that others have called for the same.

Chris Smith - AKA Buffalo Geek - joined me for a while to talk about it. We also discussed Buffalo's waterfront.

In the second hour, I talked with John Hoefle from EIR about the economic condition in the US and how to fix it. John, who testified before congress in 1993 - opposing NAFTA - says that NAFTA is part of the problem, but it's deeper than that. He said we may be better off as a country to allow the US automakers to fail. He took calls - some agreeing with his points and some disagreeing.