I can say for a fact that it was a pattern on California threads during the recall of Gray Davis and that it appeared to me they were hired GOPe operatives. It was just too repeatable. I can't say I've seen a pattern that consistent with these Small Arms Treaty threads.
That may be because there are a few of us who are actually trying to analyze this for where the real hazard is, as opposed to building an unfounded fear frenzy on the right, which is as unproductive as inattention to real risks. I respect your opinion, but I have long since decided I am not able to discern true "plants" from people for whom the question is genuine. Thus, while I might suspect someone who is playing UP the hazards of this treaty beyond legal reality of trying to aid in building the mindset that such a treaty would have any real authority to override our fundamental rights under the Constitution, I will still treat that person as if their inquiry is genuine, because even "plants" are real people, and may even be persuaded by the truth if I can make a good enough case.
Having said all that, I wish to inform you I am studying your earlier points concerning Covert and ESA and am developing an extended response, possibly good material for a law review article, so it will not be quick to produce. The indefensibly short version, and subject to revision or even partial reversal when I get the analysis done, is that Covert does indeed stand for the principle that the Bill of (individual) Rights cannot be directly overridden by any international agreement. There are a host of reasons for this, and those provided in the decision itself rely on generic principles of legal reasoning so basic and so powerful they hold a “but for” relationship to the holding. That is, while they are not the bare bones statement of holding (in Covert the disposition of military custody of Mrs. Covert), neither are they strictly “dicta” as you have used the term, mere commentary; rather, they are the Ratio decidendi, the rationale provided to establish the legal authority of the decision, and are therefore not disposable as mere throwaway commentary.
There is some irony, therefore in your use of the Endangered Species Act to demonstrate the contrary position, as it can be argued it derives its present (illegitimate) force from Justice Holmes’ TRUE “obiter dictum” in Missouri v Holland concerning the Supremacy Clause, statements which are not dispositive of the case holding, but which have encouraged the “living constitution” crowd to blindly accept at least the possibility that the treaty power could be used to trump the Bill of Rights.
But I do concede, and did concede in my earliest posts in this thread, that abuses of individual rights may occur under a regime that is lawless at its core. So I hope you realize I have not minimized the hazard. I agree there is one. I have simply located it elsewhere than our own Constitution. I have located it in the hearts of evil persons who have no use for our law other than to aggregate power for themselves.
And I further concede the subject is complex and has been hotly debated. This short statement of mine by no means exhausts even the beginnings of a fair treatment of the subject. I simply wish for people to be aware that the Constitution and precedent law stand as friends to the natural rights our founders sought to protect for us, their posterity. Even the abuses of the ESA have occurred, not as a direct contravention of property rights, but from what I have seen so far, are always inflicted by indirect means (contractual technicalities, standing, etc.), and more recently even giving way to Fifth Amendment concerns (See Tulare Lake Basin Water Storage District v. United States, 49 Fed. Cl. 313 (Fed. Cl. 2001)), though admittedly still an unsettled area of the law.
So while I agree we should mightily resist the acceptance of such a treaty, it is not because natural right or our Constitution can be bent to support such usurpations. It is because we need to prevent the Regime from acquiring yet another propaganda tool by which it will be able to persuade the low information voter, against all reason and history, that the Constitution supports the subversion of the Constitution, and therefore we can use treaties to start from scratch. In my opinion, arguments that legitimize such propaganda are not helpful to our cause. I hope you understand I do not think ill of anyone sincerely making such an argument. Only that it is incorrect and unhelpful.
Furthermore, I reserve the right to change my opinion upon further study, within limits. If all else fails, I will still hold we have natural rights that are inalienable, and that the right to life is the main spring from which flows the derivative rights, including the right to armed self-defense, that the Constitution when understood as it was intended will always come down on the side of those rights, no matter who dares speak against them, and on those beliefs you can be sure I will never waver.
Peace,
SR