"...the American Judiciary, which is supposed to function as “the Guardian of Liberty.”
Posted on 12/05/2003 10:08:03 AM PST by 45Auto
Approximately 30 days ago I received a long email from someone. At the end was a moderate length, beautifully phrased quotation, the core essence of which was this idea: a person who devotes his adult life to try to hold government accountable so citizens do not have to resort to force is noble and is devoted to one of life’s most noble pursuits. When I read that I thought of people I know, who have stretched me to grow. Those who are engaged in that noble cause know who they are.
Today, I am sad: The United States Supreme Court rejected the Silveira v. Lockyer case, and I do not feel free. I have not felt that way for a long time. My brain’s rational thought processes convince me that I am not truly free. This is because I, and others, have been, and still are, denied one or more of our most fundamental rights enshrined in the U.S. Constitution. Instead, we have only the illusion of freedom and the reality of oppression. Oppression is enforced via perverted rules, misleaders and their subordinates.
These perverted rules exist. What follows is crucial. Please pay close attention. The perverted rule I will highlight is not complex, but it is vital that you comprehend this perversion.
Arguably, the most perverted key rule is this one: Immunity for government and its agents who abuse their powers and who disrespect citizens’ rights. Example: the First Amendment’s “right to petition government for redress of grievances” sounds wonderful. It is lovely. Ditto for the ban against ex post facto laws, and the entire Bill of Rights. But the core, corrosive, corrupting, over-all-arching problem, is this: None of these rights are self-enforcing nor worth anything when a) Citizens are too gutless to demand that their peaceful assertion of rights be honored, and b) Government has passed laws that make its Executive, its Legislature, its Judiciary, and its sworn peace officers, immune for their wrongdoing in contravention of citizens’ rights.
What value is the “right to petition to redress grievances” or to file a lawsuit (which is a form of the right to petition government for a redress of a legitimate grievance) when the petition or lawsuit or both crashes into the solid legal wall of government immunity or the government refuses to hear the petition (lawsuit) or refuses to take it seriously or refuses to apply the applicable law correctly?
That is what happened with Silveira at the Federal 9th Circuit. A majority of judges at the 9th Circuit upheld its prior decisions that the Second Amendment does not guarantee an individual right to arms. The judges, in their prior decision, declared the Second Amendment does not guarantee an individual right to arms, and they reaffirmed that decision with their Silveira decision. They were given an opportunity to revisit their precedent, and they failed to do so. A handful of judges with a Constitutionally correct comprehension of the Second Amendment dissented, but their righteous message did not prevail. Hence, we have judges interpreting away a right in the guise of construction of a Constitutional provision. But the Second’s text remains unchanged: “the right of the people” is still “the right of the people.” The Second does not state, “the right of the army” nor “the right of the police.” “[S]hall not be infringed.” is, pragmatically, as clear, as strong and as bright a constitutional command as can be constructed with four words. The militia referenced in the Second’s beginning was, for the Framer’s time, a synonym for most of the people who merely functioned in a different capacity while still retaining their own privately owned fire arms. But, that is part of the problem. Rights are expressed in words. Words are plastic. Words are malleable. Judges are wordsmiths. Some like to stretch malleable words to conform to their bias, their judgment. And, judges are legally immune for their judicial acts, because they said so.
The only “immunity” that expressly appears in the original U.S. Constitution, before it was amended, is stated at Article IV, Section 2, Clause 1:
“The citizens of each state shall be entitled to all privileges and immunities of citizens in the several states.”
“Entitled” is code for “a legally enforceable claim.” “Immunity” is a synonym for freedom from prosecution or punishment for peacefully exercising a right, which is tantamount to a right to exercise a right, without government’s permission being required and without fear of punishment.
The Constitution does not declare that the three branches of government and/or their agents, nor any of them, have immunity for what they do in office in contravention of peaceful citizens’ rights or immunities.
Reformulated, the truth is this:
1) We are supposed to have rights;
2) Too often those rights prove to be illusory; and
3) They prove to be illusory because governments — American governments (federal/state/local) — can invade those rights and escape being held accountable because of the overlapping array of unconstitutional immunities governments now enjoy, with the blessings of the American Judiciary, which is supposed to function as “the Guardian of Liberty.”
For a more detailed, scholarly elaboration of this “right to petition versus immunity” problem, everyone is strongly encouraged to read John Wolfgram’s “How the Judiciary Stole the Right to Petition” which can be found on line at: http://www.constitution.org/abus/wolfgram/ptnright.htm.
We live in a perverted, disingenuous nation full of callous, cavalier, self-righteous, constitutional illiterates, in and out of government, who are dangerous and oppressive. Despite the best efforts of some of the best people I know (their passion, sustained commitment, critical, cerebral energy, delayed gratification, sacrifice, etc., ) I have serious reservations if any of us, including myself, individually or in the aggregate, have accomplished anything meaningful in terms of “the big picture” or of delaying open armed conflict with our own governments. I suspect that all we have done is this:
1) Peacefully communicated a principled protest to government, that continues to be rebuffed;
2) Clarified what the issues are;
3) Documented that we have compelling grounds to be disgusted, alarmed, alienated, and worse, and why;
4) Established that much of government and many of its most important agents are smug, arrogant, dangerous, oppressive, and constitutionally insensitive or callous or all of the above.
5) Failed to hold governments accountable for their abuse of powers.
6) Lost control of our own governments.
Free elections every two or four years do not allow us to control our government adequately. All we do is elect people to office who can abuse us and then hide behind the same set of immunities . . . and abuse us they do, regardless of their party affiliation or campaign promises.
Even the jury system is inadequate. The judges have declared they are the sole law giver in the courtroom and all jurors have to obey the law as they give it to them, their version of the law, the same law that legislators and judges often have immunity from when they declare what the law is.
Let me put it another way: Who would sign a contract with another person when the contract said that the other person gets to determine what the rules are, gets to change the rules arbitrarily, without being held accountable, gets to unilaterally interpret and apply the rules, and gets to force you to obey his rules, and you must obey his unilateral interpretation of his rules because that is one of his rules? And he has a monopoly on force?
Now, who feels free?
Free to pay taxes? Of course? Free to obey? Of course? Free to carry a firearm in a public place, responsibly, without government’s permission, for the lawful exercise of the basic right of self-protection or lawful protection of another, to protect your hide from a criminal predator? If you do not feel free to do that, why? How free are you?
If you do not feel free to do that, do you sense that something is seriously wrong?
Do you sense that Government has violated your expression of Nature’s First Law—the Law of Self-Preservation?
This is ironic: Government “lives” as a legal fictitious person but it does not have lungs, it does not bleed, it does not have emotions. It is a non-air breather. But Government tells the air-breathers (citizens with lungs, who bleed when cut, who have a mortal existence) they must circulate in public unarmed and vulnerable to criminal predators.
How viable is the “right of self-defense” if you must first beg government’s permission to defend your life with a gun, when government thinks it has the power to withhold its permission, with immunity, and to criminally prosecute you if it catches you packing a gun without its permission?
Rights and permission are opposites. One cannot be the other as a male cannot be a female, absent a radical operation. But Government has performed that radical operation by tweaking definitions and interpretations and by imposing systemic changes (e.g., immunity for government) into our “American way of life.” These tweaks and changes are radical. Our America is far from the Founder’s America, more so in concept than in time.
I am sad because too many in government treat the U.S. Bill of Rights as a snot rag or worse, as toilet paper, and they do so smugly and arrogantly.
And worse: They are either Constitutionally insensitive, uninformed, misinformed, or callous and defiant.
I am sad because the entire purpose of the U.S. Bill of Rights was to take away government’s unfettered discretion, but, guess what, government now claims it has that very discretion that the Framers intended to deny to government, and, to exacerbate matters, government now hides behind its immunities when it commits wrongdoing, and, still worse, it has the gall to accuse citizens of hiding behind their rights and being “gun nuts” or worse when they refuse to go along to get along, when they refuse to cooperate with government, when they refuse to be an enabler in the further destruction of the Constitutional Rule of Law.
This “right to petition versus immunity” problem is like an onion. Those who try to peel back the onion to expose the problem, to comprehend the truth, come away with stinging, weeping eyes and a profoundly sad heart and psyche. Why? They discover that government speaks with a forked tongue, acts like a professional card shark, and functions like a criminal enterprise or a mafia organization. Government’s bottom line to all of us is this, “Listen to me. I have an offer you cannot refuse. Here is why . . . (X is the threat, subtle or overt or both.)”
I sometimes think I am a fool to invest so much in the name of liberty. Simultaneously, I beat myself up because I have invested so little in the name of liberty. Simultaneously, when I see more wrinkles on the top of my hands, more gray hairs on my spouse and on myself, when the knees creak more and take longer to lubricate, etc., I want to be free of the noble cause. I long to be free to be frivolous for a while. But I cannot be frivolous.
I do not know how long the center will hold. I suffer from a sad sense of foreboding. The glue that holds the Bill of Rights together has let go. Too many love their luxury and their plastic and their hair spray and Monday night football more than they do Liberty under a Constitutional Rule of Law. Too many do not even know the difference between a right and permission. Too many think the proper norm is being required to get Government’s permission.
When there is such a large mass that does not care, no law will save Liberty from indifference or ignorance or the pursuit of hedonism and love in the wrong places—the bottom of a bottle, at an ATM, between another woman’s legs, at the point of a needle, at the race track, at the card tables. Sadly, some people have taken their unfettered “pursuit of happiness” too far with their reckless self-destruction. The July 4th, 1776 Declaration declared a right to pursue “happiness,” not a right to secure that goal nor government’s duty to provide it.
How long does one continue to devote his or her life to this noble cause, which most mock, do not understand, do not appreciate? People have different limits of tolerance for perceived injustice. I am convinced some are close to reaching their “wall” and others are already there, waiting for others to catch up to them, and, given certain stimuli, a significant flashpoint will erupt.
We are deep into a cold war with our own governments — governments which inexplicably persist with violating their own rules and hiding behind their immunities while demanding that citizens blindly obey their crimes which they call laws.
Who agrees with me that government is morally incongruous? Hypocritical? Inconsistent? Self-serving? Dangerous? Reckless? A criminal enterprise?
If a foreign occupying force did to us what our own government is currently doing to us we would resort to arms to stop the oppression and reduce the invader to maggot meat. Yet, we tolerate what our government is doing to us. Examples: Our governments have set us up to be easy prey for criminal plunder; have denied us the most basic right to defend our lives without their permission, which they callously withhold, and imprudently confirm—or assert—that we do not have a constitutional right to retain the pragmatic means to enforce our rights, namely, unregistered, privately owned, firearms.
Why do we tolerate our own government doing what we would not tolerate from a foreign occupying force?
Guess what? Our government is the occupying force.
Guess what? We live in a not so benign police state.
Guess what? Our government treats us as the enemy.
Guess what? Our government fears freedom and is Liberty’s biggest thief!
Guess what? The Founders, the Framers, and the deceased combat vets are puking. We are unworthy of their vision, their hardships, their sacrifices, their courage. They gave up their todays and tomorrows so we could have ours, and what have we done with ours? We all blindly obey — in lock step unison — and some seek love in the wrong places.
We have proven unable to preserve our Constitutionally limited democratic republic with certain rights guaranteed for all at all times. We have not been minding the store. We deserve an “F” in civics. We are called citizens but we function more like relatively well kept peons.
I would love for the noble cause to prevail without violence. I simply do not expect that to happen in my lifetime. I am profoundly sad. The eternal whirlwind — anti-Liberty versus Liberty — spins on, sucking us up into its vacuum, holding us to it tighter and tighter. Is there no way out for us other than to “kill” our conscience, to abandon our civic duty, to kill ourselves, to kill our perceived oppressors, or to be successful in our noble cause? If so, what is that way “out”?
Who would elect to be “dropped” by this whirlwind if they could so elect?
Why?
Who would prefer to be a steer, incapable of critical thought, of a sense of tomorrow, of justice, “free” to chew his cud and to wander in a closed field until the owner decides to put a bullet in your skull? Even then, as a steer, would you know? Would you care? Would you give a damn? We, as humans, know what steers do not know.
Now that the U.S. Supreme Court refused to take Silveira, condemning about 25% or more of the American population to live in a “no right to firearms” jurisdiction, when the gun grabbers send government goons to confiscate the guns, what then? Are those guns recreational sticks or Liberty’s teeth?
Who is ready to surrender Liberty’s teeth? To peacefully step into the cattle cars? To live on your knees? To take the slap in the face once one is disarmed and rendered a pissant, forced to kiss, lick, and polish the statists’ boots?
Can homicide be justified for a noble purpose? Adolf thought so. Can an anti-Adolf think likewise, with compelling justification? I think so. Patrick Henry thought so. So did tens of thousands or more of the people who brought America out from under the yoke of British tyranny not so long ago.
Everyone who signed the July 4th Declaration knew the king would not let them go in peace. They knew when they signed that they would have to be willing to commit homicide and encourage and equip others to do so if they were going to successfully enforce their declaration. Who finds it difficult to think of George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, James Madison, etc., as killers of human beings? I do not. People need to get realistic. The Founders were, in the eyes of the Crown, criminals, outlaws, and murderers.
Who thinks the gun grabbers are unwilling to be murderers themselves or unwilling to sanction murder under color of law to disarm the American civilian populace so they can impose their views on the rest of us?
The English in modern times surrendered their arms. What did they get in return? Their crime rate has increased meaningfully. Criminals love to prey on unarmed, vulnerable suckers. The English Government did away with the ban on double jeopardy. Now, if the Government cannot convict you on the first try, it gets to try again.
Do you think “it” or “that” will never happen here? If so, you are naïve. We are on an increasingly steeper slope toward a free fall into tyranny. The U.S. Supreme Court’s rejection of Silveira made that slope steeper—much steeper. That fact is simply not appreciated by some.
I loathe ending on a sad note, with reference to homicide. That is, however, a candid measure of my disgust, alienation, outrage, sadness.
So far, constitutional parchments have not proven to be effective in curbing or reducing government’s abuse of its powers.
I now have a greater appreciation for the enormity of, and the seriousness of, the problem, plus the size and complexity of possible solutions to the problem and the limitations of contending solutions.
Even though a firearm is a crude, inadequate solution to this type of a problem (namely, holding government accountable for its abuses of its powers, including its failure to take constitutional rights seriously), I now also appreciate better, at a higher, more intense level, what I perceive to be the true import—and value—of the Second Amendment.
Sadly, the U.S. Supreme Court, by rejecting the Silveira case, stiff-armed those who think like I do. That rejection was imprudent. Rejecting Silveira does not fix the problem. It aggravates the problem. The Supremes were the end of the line (legal line—at least judicially) not because they are mentally superior, but because they are the end of our legal judicial line to non-violently resolve an enormous, serious, festering problem that instantly got worse the moment the Supremes rejected Silveira.
We need to be disciplined, creative, resourceful, and suck it up to overcome this set back, this acute disappointment. But how? What viable alternatives exist? How long can one put a brake on meritorious outrage?
Absent some remedy that I do not foresee, I am afraid that a violent confrontation with our own Government(s) looms ahead. I have a foreboding: Government officials will miscalculate once too often and U.S. citizens will be forced to demonstrate their commitment to their noble cause, forcing them to resort to violence as a last ditch effort to prevent Total Tyranny and to restore Liberty. That it would come to that, that my mind would even go there, makes me profoundly sad.
Simultaneously, I am comforted knowing I have access to “Liberty’s teeth,” others of like mind do, too, and I am convinced some have the courage to use “Liberty’s teeth” when pressed too far, and it becomes morally justified. I am convinced there is a 1-3% of hardcore patriots spread throughout the nation who will fire, who are committed to doing so, who are waiting for an event to justify doing so while simultaneously pursuing, peacefully, with a deep commitment to a noble cause, a non violent resolution of this enormous problem. When that 1-3% fire, that will embolden another 5-10% to also fire. Perhaps a total of around 15-18% will openly resort to arms to enforce their rights. While those numbers are small in terms of percentage they are enormous in terms of numbers of human beings willing to wage war against government and its agents. I also foresee government reprisals backfiring and causing more to join the original 1-18%. That hard core nucleus of “Do Not Tread On Me” Patriots will prevail.
I suspect some naïve gun grabbers and those who are indifferent find it too incredulous to believe that some American citizens will kill other American citizens to retain their firearms. I suspect other gun grabbers know they will be Target No. 1 and they have been deterred by those privately owned guns.
The situation reminds me of a story a friend recently sent me. The story went like this: An air traffic controller received a pilot’s request for clearance to 60,000 feet. The controller radioed back, “And what makes you think you can get to 60,000 feet?” The pilot radioed back, “I am requesting clearance down to 60,000 feet.” The pilot flew an SR-71 Blackbird super spy plane. My point is: Too many do not fully comprehend that many in “the patriot movement” are above 60,000 feet in commitment and they will use Liberty’s teeth as a last ditch method to avoid Total Tyranny and to restore the Constitutional Rule of Law. When they function that way, they will discharge their Constitutionally sanctioned duty, as an organized or unorganized militia, even if only as a militia of one, replicated tens of thousands of times or more throughout the nation.
I am profoundly sad. I foresee what a few who implement a lethal force offense can do. I reference what recently happened in the Washington, D.C. area when just two people apparently functioned as one sniper team. Imagine what many more snipers could do around the nation if they targeted those who championed more victim disarmament laws.
We live in snarly times, making pursuit of the noble cause more critical, more necessary, more noble. But, the peacemakers, the constitutionalists, will probably lose the noble fight. The gun grabbers will eventually grossly miscalculate and motivate some to implement a lethal force offense. The outcome will be determined on the battlefield — any town continental U.S.A. — not the courtroom. This is because too many judges, as a group, are no longer the guardians of liberty, most politicos are unscrupulous hacks or useful idiots for tyrant wannabes, and the majority keeps electing them or tolerating them. Simultaneously, too many Black Robes espouse a functional equivalent of legal bubonic plague, especially when it comes to the Second Amendment.
I have read many decisions on the First and Fourth Amendment by 9th Circuit judges who do not share my views on the Second Amendment. Their views on the First and Fourth are excellent. Reading their decisions on the those amendments is deeply satisfying and comforting. Their decisions convince me they are highly intelligent, articulate, extraordinarily logical and persuasive, and, for those amendments, they are superb Guardians of Liberty. Their views on the Second, however, are appalling. To go from one of their First/Fourth Amendment decisions to one of their Second Amendment decisions is like going from an A+ student’s term paper to a D- student’s term paper, from Madison to Stalin. I do not understand why these judges seem to have such an abrupt, illogical disconnect. I suspect it turns on power: They know that a man with a loaded firearm is empowered to kill a would-be oppressor. Can it be that simple?
We are in a downward spiral toward some flashpoint where a hardcore of no-nonsense “no more” constitutionalists will press the issue and not submit to perceived, insufferable oppression.
I regret that so far the Wolfgrams, Shamayas, Codreas, Pucketts, Zelmans, Gorskis, etc., have not scored a meaningful slam dunk clear, non-violent victory.
Sometimes, those who wage, peacefully, the noble fight, manifest sparks among themselves, but they pull the wagon in the same basic direction for the same basic excellent reasons. Thank you. Now, they need to pull harder in a more unified manner and avoid becoming a vectored gaggle.
I would not bet, however, on how much longer their hearts and psyches can, or will, endure and stay focused and committed to a non-violent resolution. I am reminded of a man I know. He told me he is a Yale law school graduate, an Ex-U.S. Marine Corps A-6 Intruder attack pilot with hundreds of missions over North Vietnam, and, an ex-attorney. He quit the practice of law because the judges “tore [his] heart out”.
Some U.S. citizens seem to be willing to wait their entire life for the noble cause to be successful and are willing to never resort to lethal force. I, on the other hand, am impatient. I do not want to wait. I want the birthright to be honored now. It is already long overdue. I experience waiting to be the functional equivalent of enabling—of giving our misleaders and their agents the functional equivalent of the green light to continue to oppress. I am reminded of Henry’s “Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death” speech. I experience that title to be a misnomer. Anyone who has read that speech knows Pat Henry was not really saying he wanted liberty or death, and certainly not death for himself. Instead, he was saying to his countrymen, “Damn it, we shall have Liberty now. I [Henry] am willing to risk death for Liberty and die for Liberty. Who will join me [Henry] to kill the son-of-a-bitch who would dare deny me [Henry] and you Liberty? If the Crown will not back down, let us prey against the Crown! If not now, when? When we are weaker? Never!”
Simultaneously, I do not want to imprudently pre-empt. I know the dire consequences, and my moral code is repulsed by the idea of initiating a lethal mini-hell against anyone. On the other hand, those who tolerate indefinitely government’s fecal matter give it a perpetual green light to bury all of us in a pile of more fresh fecal matter, higher and deeper.
The Founders did not wait indefinitely. They forced the issue with their declaration. They did so knowing that thousands of Redcoats were already embarked in ships for the colonies, to be followed by thousands more, and each was sent to “redress” the Founders’ grievances at the point of a bayonet, bullet, or rope.
I know “the gun solution” (political assassination, open rebellion, etc.) is fraught with peril and inadequate and morally complex and legally illegal. But, what is left? When we peacefully claim our birthrights, peacefully pursue a lawsuit to the U.S. Supreme Court and are stiff-armed while we point to what is written in the Constitution, we are mocked, scorned, ridiculed, rebuffed, ignored, dismissed, and rejected. Symbolically, Government, like a modern main battle tank, rolls on, crushing us as if we were anthills.
The “organic law” of the United States is composed of three documents: the July 4, 1776 Declaration of Independence, the original U.S. Constitution, and the U.S. Bill of Rights.
Do you know what is considered to be the very first United States law? Per one of this nation’s largest established print and electronic law book publishers, West, the very first United States law is: the July 4, 1776 Declaration of Independence. (One can confirm that by going to the beginning of the first volume of West’s Annotated United States Code.)
That fact is significant. Independently of that fact, all readers are recommended to ponder ultra carefully—more than once—this excerpt from the July 4th Declaration’s second paragraph:
“. . . Whenever any form of government becomes so destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security. . . .” [emphasis added]
In 1776, those words were potent, and from the King’s perspective, they were political poison and the Declaration’s signers signed the functional equivalent of their death sentence.
Now, let us briefly revisit key parts of these words and reflect critically.
“. . . [D]estructive of these ends . . . .” What ends? For that, loop to the beginning of the Declaration’s second paragraph for context to find the “ends” referenced.
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, that whenever a
"We live in a perverted, disingenuous nation full of callous, cavalier, self-righteous, constitutional illiterates, in and out of government, who are dangerous and oppressive. Despite the best efforts of some of the best people I know (their passion, sustained commitment, critical, cerebral energy, delayed gratification, sacrifice, etc., ) I have serious reservations if any of us, including myself, individually or in the aggregate, have accomplished anything meaningful in terms of “the big picture” or of delaying open armed conflict with our own governments."
"...the American Judiciary, which is supposed to function as “the Guardian of Liberty.”
Who would sign a contract with another person when the contract said that the other person gets to determine what the rules are, gets to change the rules arbitrarily, without being held accountable, gets to unilaterally interpret and apply the rules, and gets to force you to obey his rules, and you must obey his unilateral interpretation of his rules because that is one of his rules? And he has a monopoly on force?
Well said and worthy of remembrance
Indeed, the judiciary has become merely the "rubber stampers" of authoritarian legislatures. I can't wait to see what a travesty they make of the Pledge case, going so far as to allow that moron, Neudow to argue the case himself.
By ignoring cases which bring to the fore authentic Constitutional issues like the basic RKBA, and taking cases which are more to the liking of the 6 social engineers on the bench, they not only make a mockery of themselves, they mock real justice and demonstrate that they have no regard whatsoever for the one thing that made (note past tense) the United States unique: Liberty. The Constitution does not exist to grant government unlimited powers and immunity from the Rule of Law. Nor does it exist to limit the FREEDOM of the good citizens of the nation. The actions of the Supreme Court turn the Constitution upside down. The least damage that could result is that a larger and larger percentage of the citizenry simply develop contempt for the Court in specific and for the Rule of Law in general, leading to widespread flouting of their stupid, unconstitutional, asinine rules. The worst that could happen is the armed conflict that Mancus speaks about. Its clear from the failure to grant cert in this case that Rehnquist, Scalia and Thomas are the only ones who wished to hear it. That the other six cowardly, commie social engineers, Souter, Ginsburg, Kennedy, Breyer, O'Conner, and Stevens, were afraid to hear this case because they knew they could not rule in favor of the 9th Circuit's decision and still maintain any credibility at all.
So now, the status quo for the good citizens living under the tyrannical shadow of the 9th Circuit is that they have no basic, Constitutional right to keep and bear arms; yet I don't think the rotten bastards in any of the state legislatures have the guts to actually write, let alone pass, a total gun ban/confiscation. They have no more courage than the @sswipes on the SC that failed once again in their duty to protect the Constitution. Still, that possibility now exists under the jurisdiction of the 9th. And the rotten ban stands as "good" case law, remaining as a stepping stone to yet further bans.
Without the means of personal self-defense, attempting to exercise liberty and pursue happiness are exercises in futility. Any government that denies its Citizens the right to self-defense is a government that begs to be dis-embowelled. First and foremost, our peculiar form of government was established to protect rights and to promote an environment for exercising them. If it fails that task, what We the People have created, We the People will dis-assemble and repair in a 'well-regulated' manner.
I am not going to give up on the good fight until the bastards put me in the ground. I know they would be only too happy to do so. Waco demonstrated that very well.
I don't know how long this nation can continue to call itself a Constitutional Republic; certainly, it still stands at least on paper, but much of the true liberty which the Founders wrote of so eloquently no longer exists. Oh, to be sure, we can still go about the nation unimpeded, spend our hard-earned dollars (at least the few that the government "allows" us to keep) on the necessities of life, go to the voting booth every few years and fool ourselves that we are voting for people who really give a damn about what this nation used to stand for, buy guns (the ones the government has approved) as long as we "pass" the government-mandated "tests", and actually carry these arms concealed in a majority of states (again, as long as we can pass the test), but our private property rights have been nearly completely taken away and we labor under the heavy burden of 50% taxation. The RKBA has been turned into the PKBA - Permission to Keep and Bear Arms - and what government giveth, government can taketh away.
As long as these little barriers to real liberty do not cause us much trouble, we willingly submit; but it won't be too long before simple traffic tickets become grounds for denial of the PKBA. If the Brady Boob gets her way, Congress will pass a federal "Needs-based" gun licensing Law. That will effectively be the end of liberty in the US. Once the 2nd is gone, there will be no more need for government to uphold the pretense that the citizenry is free and that it exists solely to defend that freedom. It will finally be the "straw that broke the Camel's back". The only question is whether we will go quietly into the abyss of slavery, or actually summon the courage to follow in the footsteps of the Founders.
That's right. I saw a table of benefits and qualifications for benefits in the new presciption drug coverage and I got feedback from a bunch of retirees. They were bitching, because they wouldn't get their pills for free. See they had too much cash on hand and overall net worth. They were even ignorant enough to say they paid for it when they were working.
"When there is such a large mass that does not care, no law will save Liberty from indifference or ignorance or the pursuit of hedonism and love in the wrong places—the bottom of a bottle, at an ATM, between another woman’s legs, at the point of a needle, at the race track, at the card tables. Sadly, some people have taken their unfettered “pursuit of happiness” too far with their reckless self-destruction."
These things may be morally reprehensible, and they may represent "Libertin-ism" more than they do "Liberty", but one man's poison is another man's sacrament, and the Constitution, although written by men of moral courage, no more prevents self-destructive behavior than it does the basic right to own arms.
"Today, these comments are treated as hyperbole, a mere gentleman’s exercise in arousing legislators to action. With Henry, nothing could be further from the truth. For as Murray Rothbard has pointed out numerous times, the court historians of our age would have us believe that the American revolution was no revolution at all, but merely an unfortunate disagreement among refined compatriots.But for Patrick Henry – and he was certainly not alone in such sentiments – British rule was nothing short of barbaric tyranny, a despotism to be ripped from American soil no matter what the price in blood. In 1775, Patrick Henry was not simply attempting to arouse the passions of his fellow Virginians. He was suggesting a practical course of action: arming the population of Virginia against the troops of the British Crown. By late April he was making good on his own exhortations, and following the British seizure of a cache of arms owned by the Virginia militia, Henry himself led a militia company in a raid on the British capturing British funds as compensation for the theft of the arms." - Ryan McMaken
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