debate

♫ Sunshine Go Away Today…♫

♫…I don’t feel much like dancin’…♫

Kent McManigal shares with us an essay regarding the essence of personal liberty, freedom and individual rights in this Constitutional Republic.

I find it sad that whenever someone wants to do something, the first question most people ask is whether government allows it, requires a license, or forbids it.

There is so much that isn’t (or shouldn’t be) the business of government.  Most personal conflicts are attached to an understood contract between individuals in the free marketplace – If you don’t like guns, don’t buy one; if that head of lettuce is bad too soon, don’t buy them there, anymore; don’t like illegal drugs, don’t use them.

There are remedies before getting the government involved.  That shouldn’t be our go-to choice.  It should be the last resort.

This isn’t a pointless philosophical debate. On May 5, President Obama warned Ohio State University graduates to reject the warnings people like me are passing along, and to simply trust government.

My motivation is that I trust you to run your own life, and I want you to understand liberty and experience it in all its glory.

What might his motivation be?

If you can be fooled into asking the wrong questions, the answers don’t matter.

This should be our (libertarian’s) anthem. – Guffaw

h/t Kent’s “Hooligan Libertarian” Blog

There’s a point here…

So…

Initial investigation has determined that there were two individuals proximately responsible for the Boston Marathon bombings.  They later shot and killed a police officer.  One of the suspects was DRT*.  (Reportedly run over by the other suspect during his escape!)

The two suspects are of Chechen origin, and have lived in the United States for 10 years.  They are reportedly Muslim (as are many Chechens) and brothers.  I’ll not grant them any more fame by posting their names or photos here.

It’s been reported by family members that the two brothers never assimilated into American Culture, and had no American friends.  After 10 years (!)

“…never assimilated into American Culture” 

The point of the information reported is not that the suspects are Chechen, or Muslim, or brothers.  It’s that they lived here TEN YEARS and did not assimilate.  Period.

I’ve no problem with folks legally migrating to the United Stated and retaining connections with their home country and culture.  Hell, I’m part German and part Irish stock – have celebrated St. Patrick’s Day and Octoberfest.  But, I’m an American.

It used to be if folks came to America, it was to find the freedom here – to become American.  I used to know an Italian family who owned a pizza place.  Tiny Italian and American flags all over the restaurant, coupled with a picture of the President and the Pope on the back wall.  And they had many friends and customers of all ethnicities and nationalities.

I don’t know if these guys were home-grown terrorists, turned by a radical Muslim/Chechen faction, or part of a sleeper cell.  Perhaps we’ll never know.

But, I do know if they’d assimilated, there’d have been less of a chance of violence used against us.

I wonder if the families of the Mexican kids who tore down the American Flag at their high school and ran up a Mexican flag understand this?

Come here to be part of American culture – or stay home.

*dead right there – thanks to John Farnham

Drone On, Part Deux

Senator Rand Paul reportedly received a self-described short answer to his question of the United States Attorney General regarding whether or not ANY President could order a drone attack on a U.S. citizen within the geographic confines of the U.S.

The short answer – NO.

Of course, if there is to be a long legal interpretation of this response it remains to be seen.  After all, it might depend on what the meaning of IS NO is. 

And, our esteemed A.G. obviously arrived at the top law enforcement post by understanding the law and keeping to the straight and narrow. (sarcasm font)

The Daily Caller recounts that as a student at Columbia, Eric Holder took part in “a five-day occupation of an abandoned Naval Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC) headquarters,” which Holder and his fellow radicals demanded be redesignated the “Malcolm X Lounge.” Columbia, consistent with its usual practices at the time, went along with the radicals’ demands.

The Black Student Organization’s web site said that “in 1970, a group of armed black students [the SAAS] seized the abandoned ROTC office.” The “armed” part might have been wishful thinking, but Holder’s radicalism is not in doubt. On another occasion, he participated in the occupation of a dean’s office.

In March 1970 the SAAS released a statement supporting twenty-one Black Panthers charged with plotting to blow up department stores, railroad tracks, a police station and the New York Botanical Gardens.

And then there’s the pardoning of the two Weathermen terrorists.

And Fast and Furious leading to a Citation for Contempt of Congress…and ignoring New Black Panther voter intimidation.

His racism (anti-White bias).

His supporters state he’s only been ‘leveling the playing field’ for his race; the same argument The President uses.  So all this is okay, right?

Answer me this:  How does a man get to the level of chief law enforcement officer of the United States after hanging with unrepentant radicals and domestic terrorists in his college years?  How is such a person vetted?

Some would suggest these questions also apply to his boss.  I’m told that’s nothing more than guilt by association, though.

h/t Powerline, Fire Andrea Mitchell site

The NRA

Mama Liberty commented on my post yesterday, mentioning the National Rifle Association’s flip-flopping with regard to various issues involving federal law.  Specifically the whole ‘no guns in school’ thing.

It seems they initially supported such a thing, then became wiser.  They’ve done the same thing with regard to other gun control laws and politicians (giving some folks a Grade of A, when they voted mostly in the anti-rights tent).

In short, they’re wafflers and inconsistent, at best.

I’ve thought on more than one occasion about sending back my Life Membership Card (which I paid for in monthly installments!) with a better-than-terse letter regarding many of these inconsistencies.

But I’ve not yet done that.  Why not, you ask?

Well, because, in spite of their failings, they’re still one of the best tools we have in this battle.  There are others:  The Second Amendment Foundation and Jews For The Preservation of Firearms Ownership come to mind.

Find the group or groups you can support and do so.  Four-and-one-half million people coalesced into a lobbying force is remarkable!  47% of American households reportedly possess firearms.  The NRA and other pro-rights groups memberships should be even larger.

Yeah, they aren’t perfect.  But…

“We must all hang together, or assuredly we shall all hang separately”  -  Benjamin Franklin

Easy-Peasy! TAKE ACTION NOW!

Ruger Firearms has a web page dedicated to YOU taking action to contact our elected officials with regard to the issue of gun control.

They suggest you contact these people NOW, and provide the means do so.

If you are too lazy to visit their website, I’ve copied the text and links below.  You may call the folks, email ALL of them simultaneously! (based on your address and zip) and forward the links to your friends.

Easy-Peasy.

Step one: Please click on one of the buttons to the right for an easy way to tell your legislators you care about gun rights. The Take Action Now! button allows you to send a prepared email letter quickly and easily. The Find Your Representatives button has detailed contact information for each of your legislators so, if you prefer, you can call them or write them a more personal letter.

Step two: Get all your friends to help support our rights; ask them to click on the link and send letters too. Click here to email this web page to your friends.

More: Many elected officials have been looking for an opportunity to curtail our gun rights and think they can win now if they move quickly while emotions are high. In Washington D.C. and in state legislatures across the country, anti-gun forces are gathering and conspiring in an effort to pass bad legislation that goes beyond anything we have ever seen. At least one legislature is discussing making public the identity of all pistol permit holders, treatment typically reserved for convicted sex offenders.

Reality seems to be lost on these folks. Cities like Washington D.C. and Chicago, with some of the strictest gun laws on the books, are hotbeds of violent crime. Nationally, violent crime involving firearms has declined since the expiration of the Federal “assault weapons ban,” while lawful ownership of firearms has increased. More lawful gun ownership, less crime.

To help your voice be heard, we have set up this special service on our website. By clicking on the Take Action Now! link, you can contact your legislators.

Please act now, before it’s too late.

FTC – Ruger Firearms gives me nothing, save an easy way to get my voice heard in Washington and my State Capitol.  Now go away.

h/t Traction Control

Americans For Responsible Solutions

Former Representative Gabrielle Giffords, and her husband astronaut Mark Kelly have walked a long path together.  With the Nation watching.

She was shot and seriously wounded (and six others killed) in a Tucson assassination attempt.  Her recovery has been brave, to say the least.

Now she and her husband are launching a group to “launch a national dialogue and raise funds to counter influence of the gun lobby.”

“In response to a horrific series of shootings that has sown terror in our communities, victimized tens of thousands of Americans, and left one of its own bleeding and near death in a Tucson parking lot, Congress has done something quite extraordinary – nothing at all,” the pair wrote in an editorial published Tuesday on their site and in USA Today.  (emphasis Guffaw)

Americans For Responsible Solutions

If they were indeed looking for responsible solutions, a national dialogue,  wouldn’t including the NRA and other like-minded organizations in the discussion be appropriate?  Isn’t that what the Left is always touting, discussion before taking action?  Inclusion?

To me, responsible sounds an awful lot like reasonable when it comes to Gun Control.  As in “we need reasonable gun control”.  As if the previously-enacted thousands of laws and regulations aren’t enough.  If we can pass just one more law…

And, of course, criminals don’t obey laws!

They’ve certainly a right to their opinion.  They’ve been on a public tour; went to Newtown, Connecticut; met with NYC Mayor Bloomberg – an anti-rights freak if there ever was one.  Had a Big-Gulp, greasy fries or a smoke in NY,  lately?  Nanny Bloomberg is watching you!

And we’ve a right to our opinion.  No thank you, Ms. Gifford and Mr. Kelly.  “Include me out” as film mogul Samuel Goldwyn is to have said.

h/t NBC News

Something on which to chew…

Borepatch brings us a link to Simon Grey, and adds some additional content.  A taste:

why both Anarchism and Collectivism fail:

Both, ideologies fail because the logic and assumptions that are applied to the state are not applied to the operants of the state: individuals. Basically, anarchists have to assume that humans are intrinsically good while the government is systemically evil, while collectivists have to assume that humans are inherently bad while the state is systemically remedial. To put it in programming jargon, anarchists assume good in, garbage out; collectivists assume garbage in, good out. The state, though, is merely a mechanism and is neither intrinsically corrupting nor intrinsically remedial. If the effects of the state are remedial or corrupting, it is only because the people within (and in administration of) the state are remedial or corrupting.

Borepatch then reminds us:

Pournelle’s Iron Law of Bureaucracy states that in any bureaucratic organization there will be two kinds of people:

 First, there will be those who are devoted to the goals of the organization. Examples are dedicated classroom teachers in an educational bureaucracy, many of the engineers and launch technicians and scientists at NASA, even some agricultural scientists and advisors in the former Soviet Union collective farming administration.

Secondly, there will be those dedicated to the organization itself. Examples are many of the administrators in the education system, many professors of education, many teachers union officials, much of the NASA headquarters staff, etc.

The Iron Law states that in every case the second group will gain and keep control of the organization. It will write the rules, and control promotions within the organization.

But, you really need to read both BP’s addition and the original to grok the whole thing.  Quite profound, really.

Bullet Points

Just in case you encounter someone with no knowledge of history or the Constitution in your travels.  Some appropriate responses:

h/t Blue’s Blog, Modern Musket

The ‘Debate(s)’, NOW with more Gun Control!

I didn’t watch the first debate.  Nor the second.  Nor the third.  I’ve three reasons for not doing so, to wit:

1.  They are NOT debates, but rather stump speeches with responses.  They don’t answer questions, just push their own agendas!  (The President – Assault Weapons Ban, again!)  (And Governor Romney – The Second Amendment is NOT about hunting!)

2.  Not all viable candidates were asked to participate, and

3.  The participants are not under oath when answering.

Well, there IS another reason:

4.  Why do I care what Tweedledee and Tweedledum have to say!  Both are avowed statists with big government agendas.  Not exactly my political stance.

“Government is not a solution to our problem, government is the problem.” – Ronald Reagan

My understanding, via the wisdom of the Internet, is the Republican took the first one, handily.  The Democrat
interrupted and laughed a lot during the second.  And CNN voted for the Republican both times.  CNN!  CNN said the President won last night.

Re:  Gun Control (a rant) -
Mr. President, the Clinton Assault Weapon Ban did nothing to stop crime.  Crime went down significantly when it finally sunset 10 years later.  And virtually all the current statistics (except those from the totalitatian-loving, anti-rightist folks) show as there is more gun ownership today, and crime is down!  I know you know this.  Because gun control isn’t about stopping crime, it’s about controlling law-abiding citizens!
News Flash:  Criminals don’t obey the law!  (end rant)

Ultimately, the only ‘debate’ that matters in the one in the voter’s head on Election Day.  All else is window dressing.

Preparedness v. Paranoia

Clayton Cramer discusses preparedness v. paranoia in a recent post.

I try to be prepared.  For years, I was like a Boy Scout, without the merit badges. (I was never able to join.  :- (
I like to plan for unforeseen circumstances, lest I be caught unaware.

I ALWAYS have a lock-blade folding knife.  My keys; my wallet; my ID and CCW permit.  ALMOST always a sidearm and reload(s).

When my daughter was around, we’d drill.  Not to the degree Mr. Cramer does (my daughter was younger) but I had a secret word if uttered, she was to either take immediate cover or drop to the deck – no questions.  And when she was even younger, we had a password if a family member or friend went to pick her up from school, just in case.  No password-no go.

Sadly, Mr. Cramer’s lessons seem sound today.  Go and educate yourself, family and friends.

BE PREPARED