This wouldn't be an issue if the Airlines could just kick people off the plane. You don't see us having laws against using Cell Phones in movie theaters, do you? Because you can bitch at an usher and they'll kick the **************** out.
It's not like this is a regular event in movie theaters. Why would it be a regular event on an airplane? I've actually never had that problem at a movie theater. Ever.
What if you ask someone to tone it down as they are shouting (ever notice how most people talk very loudly when on the phone, even though they don't have to) a foot away from your face? And they just give you the finger and carry on.
Then complain. If enough people agree with you, which I assume you believe they do, then they will complain too. Unless that airline bans that person from the plane, the reputation will get hurt, and they will lose business. It's not that difficult. You know, I don't ever seem to remember having that problem when we had those phones built into the headrests. Why would that be any different? But I guess the government approved those, and that's why we were able to get along, because we knew it was fine.
It makes for an unpleasant experience. I would wager that there would be more incidents of violence on airplanes due to that alone.
If there's violence on an airplane, they could be arrested just as well as they would on the ground. These are pretty ridiculous scenarios you're projecting here...
All of that in a cramped, tiny environment 35,000 in the air? Hell yeah, bring on the regulations.
None of these gripes even come close to justifying a legislative intervention. I wonder how many tax dollars are wasted on this crap? You do not have a right to control every little thing someone does just because you don't like it. I've got a better idea. Suck it up, and deal with it.
The argument is that flying isn't a right and given its complexity and that multiples of lives are involved the government not only has a right but even the responsibility to regulate something like that. If some sort of a constitutional rights argument is going going to be made about it then the same kind of argument can be used to answer it.
It's not like there's a list of rights laying around, detailing exactly what an American allowed to, and everything that isn't listed is illegal. So let's stop pretending that exists. Flying is not under the jurisdiction of the federal government, and it's not banned by the states, so people do have a right to fly. And they do it all the time.
Let's also not pretend that the planes would be falling out the skies of bureaucrats weren't worrying about whether people were on the cell phones or not...
Simply put, the federal government does not have the explicit power listed in the Constitution to be involved in anything like this. Or most of the stuff that it currently does for that matter. If you don't like those laws, then get a majority of people to support you, and amend the Constitution. But you do NOT have a right to ignore it. I don't care how badly you want to, or how necessary you think it is.
Like I said, most people don't care about others, but when they put themselves to be in a tight place with others where things need to be under control well, someone needs to regulate things so that those who don't care about others don't start negatively affecting those others.
So, the argument is that if there weren't regulations for airplanes, then people would do nothing but act like animals? Seems a little far-fetched... And what if someone doesn't listen to this precious regulation? Then what do you do? Wrestle them to the ground because the laws on your side? Once in a while you get a jerk is nothing but obstinate, and offensive everyone else around him, but you can't seriously think that this is grounds for regulating everyone? Or spending all the tax dollars to do it? Or that somehow an anarchic mess would result without these regulations? Let's be honest with ourselves here.
And I didn't see any of these problems when people were allowed to swipe their credit cards and use the phone I was built into the headrest. But I guess that was bureaucrat approved, so… Totally different.
The Constitution is like the Bible... it's vague as hell on a lot of points.
No, it's very specific as to what the federal government is allowed to do. The 10th amendment explicitly states that any powers that isn't
explicitly granted to the federal government, and not forbidden from Prohibition by the states, is left to the decision of the states. In fact, since this point was so obvious to everyone at the time, most people considered this amendment to be too obvious to even put in there. They saw it as a uselessly redundant formality. Yet we seem to ignore today. But of course, that was a couple hundred years ago, so, you know… It's different now.
But since you don't think this is "Constitutional":
...Why is Constitutional in quotes? Is that some sort of petty attempt to belittle it, or constitutional arguments in general? Strange...
- Coin and regulate the value of money.
- Administer the seat of government.
- Tax.
- Borrow.
- Spend.
- Punish crimes on the high seas.
- Establish federal courts.
- Pass copyright and patent laws.
- Raise and finance armed forces.
- Establish bankruptcy laws.
- Establish rules for citizenship.
- Call up state militias.
- Administer federal lands.
- Establish rules for the armed forces.
- Establish a postal system.
- Regulate commerce.
- Standardize weights and measures.
- Punish counterfeiting.
- Declare war.
- Pass laws to implement the above.
Look through that list. If this was a constitutional debate and it went to the Supreme court, they'd use the Commerce clause to rule that it was Constitutional.
Of course they would, just like every other bad decision that's come out of Supreme Court based on the inaccurate reading of commerce clause. When the Constitution was written, "regulate" didn't mean "control," it meant "to make regular." That is, to ensure an unrestricted and uncoerced flow. The reason they put that in there, is because under the Articles of Confederation, the States were imposing tariffs and sanctions on on each other, and it was creating massive imbalances, and chaos within interstate trade.
Think about it; why would the founders go through the trouble of
explicitly listing everything that the federal government
is allowed to do, and then proceed to put in an article that says they have a right to control
anything that has value? Doesn't that sound a little absurd to you? That's because it is.
But for the sake of argument let's break out the Common Sense bat and take a whack at it. People who point to the Constitution and say "ITS NOT IN THERE THEREFORE ITS ILLEGAL FOR THE GOVERNMENT TO DO XYZ" are no different than the Religious zealots who think the Bible actually says anything about birth control.
Well, that's pretty ignorant.
The Constitution by design doesn't list everything that the Government Can and Can't do.
For the Federal Government, yes it does.
Hell, most of the Supreme Court rulings in the past 50 years have been about what the intent was, not what is explicitly called out.
And a lot of the Supreme Court rulings over the past 50 years have not been constitutional. It's not like the Constitution is complicated. In fact, when it was written, it was written with the intention that a normal, everyday person could understand it very easily. There isn't any interpretation here. It's not like the wording is ambiguous, and therefore, the intent of the wording is unclear. The Constitution is very clear, and very direct about what the federal government is allowed to do. But that thing is like 200 something years old anyways, so who really cares? It's a formality really.
The intent of banning cell phones, as far as I'm concerned is safety. Similar to why most states don't allow firearms in bars. It's a combination that doesn't bode well for everyone involved.
Phones are not guns, and people are not universally wasted on a plane.
If you want to make a constitutional argument for not bringing guns into a bar, it would need to be made with the qualification that the person could not legally possess it if they were legally intoxicated beyond .08, or wherever percentage they would use to define it. You could make that argument on the grounds that the person in question could pose a direct, and potentially lethal risk to the well being of another person or persons, based on that person's impaired rational judgment and/or coordination, and the lethality of the tool they possessed.
You can't make that argument about cell phones on a plane. And please don't waste both of our time, by telling me that someone could start screaming uncontrollably, which would cause a plane to flip upside down, and crash to the ground, invariably killing everyone on board. You don't really want to write that… And I really don't want to have to read it… And then ignore it…
Finally, once more because it bears repeating, it's not like we had prolific, and horrifying consequences for having credit card enabled phones stuck in the back of the head rests on these planes. Somehow with cell phones, all hell is going to break loose? Can we just fast forward all the way to the end where we agree that this is ridiculous?
