Constitution

Polling our RIGHTS!

I don’t know about you, but with the now-ubiquitous attempts to deprive us of our natural rights to assemble, access the Internet (or tax it – a vote TODAY! Call D.C.!), speak freely, worship (or choose not to), keep the constabulary from our homes without benefit of warrant, eat unhealthy food and of course, deprive us of the right to keep and bear arms, there seems to be more and more of a movement on the part of the Fourth Estate to POLL US with these concerns:

• Should we ban (insert offensive machine here)?
• Should we prohibit (insert offensive content) from the Internet?
• Should the government monitor all our Internet accesses and emails?
• Should free enterprise and marketplace be disallowed with regard to commerce in firearms?

I’m sick of seeing such polls.  I don’t care if the entire population of New York votes en masse to prohibit me from having a soft drink larger than 16 oz., or a firearm magazine greater then 7 round capacity, or a poll in USA Today (the primary coloring book of newspapers) supports such a vote.

My rights are my individual rights.  Period.  Guaranteed.  And no attempt at ‘democracy’ (tyranny of the majority) will convince me otherwise.

Take your polls elsewhere, about other things.  Like a preference for apple or cherry pie.

Is There No One?

Knuckledraggin’ My Life Away reports about a D.C. Council member recommending legislation that would require gun owners to purchase liability insurance.

The Council Member is Mary M. Cheh, a constitutional law professor!

Is there no one out there, no constitutional law professor who actually has read and understands the U.S. Constitution?  All of them appear to be progressive folks pushing their dystopian agenda on us, under the guise of constitutional law?

Then there was that constitutional law professor a while back who proposed scrapping the Constitution.

Or are they all like this ‘professor’, cut from the same cloth as another ‘constitutional law professor’, the President?

Someone needs to look up the phrase shall not be infringed.

Where are you?  They’re giving constitutional law professors a bad name!

Tyranny of the Majority

The Liberty Sphere advises us as follows:

US tyranny to increase for foreseeable future

A close friend who is politically astute, a Tea Party activist and Christian conservative, stated Wednesday in a private conversation that America as we know it is already lost, gone, destroyed.

And not a single shot was fired. This was done entirely through the electoral process, the courts, and a clear majority of the electorate that does not share the philosophy, the mindset, or the world-view of the Founders, the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, or our nation’s rich religious heritage.

An all-important threshold was crossed, quite imperceptibly and thus totally without notice, that brought the nation into what the Founders referred to as “the tyranny of the majority.”

I seem to remember the difference between a Republic and a Democracy was defined exactly by this.  That a democracy elicited ‘tyranny of the majority’, and a Republic protected the rights of all.

When I was growing up, the phrase was, “Majority rules – Minority rights!”

However the education of the youth has devolved as described above.  In our Civics classes of yore, we were taught to revere, honor and respect The Constitution.  Now, the meme seems to be something akin to ‘whatever the United States is or has done is WRONG and BAD.  This country needs to progress beyond the old, outdated document forged by rich White guys to a New World Order.  ‘Leveling the playing field’ by fiat or diktat is more efficient and certainly more FAIR!

Somewhere within Jeff Cooper’s Commentaries, he makes a statement to the effect that the cry of THAT’S NOT FAIR is the epithet of pre-schoolers who learn as they get older that the World is just that.  Not fair.  And they demand their due.  Just like the OWS criminals terrorists protestors did – whom I suspect are those same children, older, but not yet mature.

And now, many of those children have done as Van Jones suggested.  They’ve left the collegiate quadrangle protest groups for government service.  Just as Saul Alinsky wrote in Rules for Radicals.  A cancer inside the mechanism of the Nation.  To make it ‘better’.

But, it’s not.

h/t Jeff Cooper

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

Bill of Rights Day

Today is the 221st Anniversary of the ratification by the Commonwealth of Virginia of the U.S. Constitution’s Bill of Rights, making it the Law of The Land!  Of course, this document doesn’t grant rights, it simply enumerates some important rights lest the federal government forget they exist.

Two such enumerations come to mind today – Amendment I, reminding the government we inherently possess the rights to peaceably assemble; to petition the government to redress grievances; to prohibit the government from establishing religion; and prohibiting government interference with free speech and the press.  Without which I might be restrained from writing this blog.

And, Amendment II, reminding the government the people inherently possess the right to keep and bear arms, without infringement.  The lynch pin.  A measure without whom the other nine amendments would be left to the whims of said government.

“When the people fear their government, there is tyranny; when the government fears the people, there is liberty.”  -  Thomas Jefferson

Not Happy with the Two Front Runners? Pick from the remaining Field…

When the election first appeared on my blog radar, I told you folks I would not be openly supporting any particular candidate.  I’m still not.  Openly.

We DO proceed here with the Australian Secret Ballot.  Unlike the Aussies, however, we are not required to vote.

Tired of all the pre-election fall-de-rall?  And especially of the offerings from the two major parties?

Mental Floss has listed for us 15 candidates running for President of the United States.  The blog offering is written by Miss Cellania.  Openly liberal, she does spin and flavor her text a bit.  But, it’s still interesting which folks actually throw their respective hats in the ring.  Tin foil or otherwise.

Three of the fifteen:

4. Rocky Anderson

Rocky Anderson represents the Justice Party in the 2012 presidential election. A long-time Salt Lake City lawyer, he served two terms as mayor, from 2000 to 2008. Anderson renounced the Democratic Party in August of last year, and accepted the nomination of the new Justice Party in January of 2012. The party’s platform includes the end of war, universal health care, and international cooperation on dealing with climate change. Anderson will be on the ballot in 15 states. Photograph by Flickr user Jen Wakefield-Dillier.

10. Andre Barnett

Andre Barnett is the candidate for the Reform Party USA. Barnett served with the U.S. Army and was wounded in Sarajevo in 2000. Told he would not be able to engage in heavy physical activities again, he rehabilitated himself and became a fitness model. He then founded an information technology business. Barnett’s platform includes pulling the military out of foreign countries to concentrate on homeland security, implementing tariffs on imports, lowering the corporate tax rate, and regulating the cost of health care. Three states will have Barnett on the ballot.

13. Jerry White

Jerry White is the candidate for the Socialist Equality Party, a party that follows the philosophy of Leon Trotsky. His platform involves issues of jobs, workers’ rights, and quality of life issues like universal healthcare, guaranteed minimum income, an end to foreclosures, and universal pensions. He will be on the ballot in two states.

Now you must return to the link at the top to see your other choices.  Hopefully you will find someone to you liking, other than Tweedledee and Tweedledum.

Person of Interest, Really

An occasional blog reader (and a good friend) sent me a link to a news story.

The theme surrounds an algorithm via computer, touted to predict crime ‘hotspots’ before crime occurs, so that patrol officers can ‘disrupt’ the activity, perhaps even before a crime happens.

As it states in the article:

The software generates prediction boxes – as small as 500 square feet – on a patrol map. When officers have spare time, they are told to “go in the box.”

The goal is not to boost the number of arrests, a common police benchmark to reflect crime reduction. Officers want to either intercept a crime in progress or deter would-be criminals.

“I want to disrupt an activity before an arrest is made,” Malinowski said. “You can’t arrest your way out of some of these problems.”

Police say they are having success with a computer algorithm model that helps determine where to send officers to prevent or possibly interrupt a crime, which may serve as a model for other cash-strapped law-enforcement agencies.

Coming Soon to a jurisdiction near you…

Counting Cats in Zanzibar, a blog from (the formerly Great) Britain, gives us a glimpse into where we are undoubtedly headed.

From the land that brought us the Declaration of Arboath and the Magna Carta, statements of human rights predating our Constitution and Bill of Rights, comes yet another ursurpation of personal liberty.  In a land where firearm possession, knife possession, breakable beer mug possession and even self-defense has been largely eliminated.

Because, after all, The State knows what’s good for you.

~Smoking during pregnancy is a controversial issue that gets anti-smoking puritans frothing at the mouth. In Blackpool they are taking a proactive stance by screening mothers-to-be for carbon monoxide in their blood. I’ll let Emma Harris of the Evening Gazette take up the narrative.

WOMEN are now being screened for signs of a deadly chemical as part of Blackpool’s bid to cut the number of mums-to-be smoking.

The resort still has the highest rate in the country of pregnant women who light up – at 29 per cent.

I hope these chemical checks are being performed with the permission of the women concerned. After all, according to the statistics, more than 70% of pregnant women in Blackpool don’t smoke making nearly three quarters of the tests redundant and a waste of resources if the screening is involuntary. Unfortunately Ms Harris doesn’t elucidate.~

Please go to the link above and read the whole sordid thing.

Now, I’m not saying that pregnant women smoking is the best for their unborn children.  What I am saying is pregnant women engaging in wholly legal activity (like smoking, eating fatty food, drinking) should not be singled out by the nanny state, any more than anyone else.  Come to think of it, there shouldn’t be a nanny state to single out anyone.  Freedom, what a concept! (h/t to Lonnie)

Where does the State intrusion stop?  In a nation where abortion law is the most liberal in Europe, the government is choosing to insert itself into expectant mother’s bodies for the good of the child.  Based on the baby’s rights and perceived abuse.

This is not about pro/anti-abortion or even child abuse.  It’s about the all-mighty government achieving more control.  And less personal freedom for all.

I can’t help but think of Bloomberg and his anti-gun, no sugary soda agenda.  After all, it’s for our own good.

‘I don’t have time to play this constitutional bullshit with you….’

Days of our Trailers brings our attention to yet another abuse of power.  Not by some activist judge, or some President vastly overstepping his authority, but by a commander in the police force.

As stated in the post:

“I’m not giving you the key. I’m not giving consent to enter my house,” Sgt. Corrigan recalled saying in an interview with me last week at D.C. Superior Court after the city dropped all 10 charges against him. 
“Then the cop said to me, ‘I don’t have time to play this constitutional bullshit with you. We’re going to break your door in, and you’re going to have to pay for a new door.’”

~And this wasn’t just rookie ‘Beat Cop’ , this was a Commander of the force, a person who’s sworn to uphold that ‘Bullsh!t’ he so hates.~

That’s what certain individuals put into positions of authority think of things like Due Process, obtaining Warrants, Miranda, etc.  The ‘boy in blue’ in our Nation’s Capitol.  Versus An Iraqi War Veteran.

Go see the post and the article.

“Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” – Lord Acton

h/t Thirdpower, Washington Times

Returned for Re-Grooving

(with apologies to The Firesign Theatre)

Back in the early 90′s, when I worked at TMCCC (in offices located above a shopping mall), I would sometimes take my lunch in the mall, itself.  And visit the (chain) bookstore.

During one bookstore visit, I remember seeing a new book entitled The Politically-Correct Dictionary.  This was a fairly new term in my lexicon, and I picked it up to page through, thinking it was a satirical book.  It wasn’t.  It was dead serious.

I’ve blocked most of the definitions from my mind, largely because they were stupid and/or offensive to me.
One that sticks in my brain though was GRAFFITI (n.) People’s art.  (progressively dismissing private property rights and vandalism crime in one fell swoop)

Fast forward to an entry courtesy of WyBlog (May 21, 2012).  It seems Dharun Ravi, the roommate of Tyler Joe Clementi McAllister, who was embarrassed by Mr. Ravi, outing him on a secret camera, was convicted.
Mr. McAllister committed suicide, allegedly because of this outing.