Originally Posted by
Jack Bauer
Bucking, sometimes you come of as a stroke of genius. Today not so much. Your desire to play both sides as the "fair and balanced ambassador" sometimes causes you to take position greatly at odds with other things you have brilliantly pointed out at the peril of your credibility.
The same was written about Thomas Jefferson, who was a more real to life revolutionary figure than the alcoholic Australian paid to hold the flag in your photo.
Jefferson had argued against Federal power and national debt, but, he authorized the Louisiana purchase. It was probably unconstitutional, and it resolved foreign debt while committing the US to foreign debt. He did it to avoid war and because he knew a good deal when he saw one. The residents of Arkansas, Missouri, Iowa, Oklahoma, Kansas, and Nebraska; parts of Minnesota that were west of the Mississippi River; most of North Dakota; nearly all of South Dakota; northeastern New Mexico; northern Texas; the portions of Montana, Wyoming, and Colorado east of the Continental Divide; and Louisiana west of the Mississippi River, including the city of New Orleans are all happy not to be in greater Quebec.