The Founders warned of several ways that America could be turned into a Dictatorship. Washington warned against political parties, calling them a form of despotism, which would, if left unchecked, lead to a worst form of despotism.<p>John Adams warned of the people voting to gain "wanton pleasures, the capricious will" and how that would cause a decay into anarchy.<p>As far as contradiction goes, there a a few areas that the Constitution is rather vague. The place that comes to mind is the conditions under which a President can suspend Habeas Corpus. Does Congress need to declare a national emergency first? Or can the President do this himself? The Constitution does not provide much guidance on the federal courts. This is also an area where we must be vigilant- to ensure that activist judges don't take over our country.<p>Other than a few areas of vagueness coupled with the fact that freedom requires a virtuous and moral people (Washington and Adams), who are ever vigilant in the defense of freedom, I don't know of any outright contradictions in the Constitution. I suppose that is why it is part of the reason for it being amendable- so that future generations can give further guidance to their servants in government. (Which, in itself, could lead our nation into despotism).<p>Anyone who thinks that America could never turn into a dictatorship is fooling themselves, and would be wise to remain vigilant for freedoms sake.
Summary of what I think this says (it's really long, in several posts, and I only skimmed): we don't know what the supposed contradiction was that Godel found in the Constitution.
Mark Jason Dominus wrote about this a couple of years back at <a href="http://blog.plover.com/law/Godel-dictatorship.html" rel="nofollow">http://blog.plover.com/law/Godel-dictatorship.html</a> and <a href="http://blog.plover.com/law/Godel-dictatorship-2.html" rel="nofollow">http://blog.plover.com/law/Godel-dictatorship-2.html</a> then again here <a href="http://blog.plover.com/law/Godel-dictatorship-3.html" rel="nofollow">http://blog.plover.com/law/Godel-dictatorship-3.html</a>
Interesting question: who was smarter, Einstien or Godel. Admittedly, Einstein is <i>much</i> better known but consider their insights: Einstein had the insight that acceleration and gravity were manifestations of the same phenomenae and could be modeled by curvature of space. Godel had the insight that all sufficiently complex mathematical systems are incomplete. As an (aspiring) mathematician, I find the latter to be much more profound.