Category: Politics

With this as further confirmation, if you haven’t figured out by now that demoncraps are in any sense American, I can’t help you anymore.

NASA leasing bill transformed into “voting rights” legislation.

WASHINGTON — NASA’s ability to lease property at its facilities to companies or other organizations remains in limbo after a bill meant to reauthorize it was transformed in the House into voting rights legislation.

H.R. 5746 was introduced in October by Rep. Don Beyer (D-Va.), chair of the House Science Committee’s space subcommittee. The bill extended NASA’s authorization to enter into what are known as enhanced use leases, or EULs, of agency property to companies, government agencies, or educational institutions, for 10 years. The House passed the bill by a voice vote Dec. 8.

The Senate amended the bill, extending the EUL authorization by only three months instead of 10 years, and passed it by unanimous consent, sending it back to the House.

The Democratic leadership of the House, in an unusual move, then took the Senate-amended bill and stripped out the NASA provisions, replacing it with the text of two voting rights bills and now called the “Freedom to Vote: John R. Lewis Act.” They did so because H.R. 5746 had already passed the House and Senate, so the amended version could go directly to the Senate floor without the threat of a filibuster from Senate Republicans, who oppose the voting rights legislation.

The move effectively sacrificed the NASA portions of the bill, something that Beyer said he accepted. “Though I did not expect this outcome when I first introduced the NASA Enhanced Use Leasing Extension Act, if my legislation will help overcome the filibuster, the Senate can finally have the long-overdue debate on voting rights this country deserves,” he said in a Jan. 13 statement. “I would be honored to make this unexpected contribution to the cause of protecting our democracy.”

The House passed the bill Jan. 13 220 to 203 on strict party lines, with Democrats voting in favor of the bill and Republicans against it.

Republican members, including some who co-sponsored the original H.R. 5746, strongly criticized the decision to turn the NASA bill into a vehicle for voting rights legislation. “The majority has taken a practical, bipartisan bill and gutted it, inserting 735 pages of unrelated legislation and forcing the House to vote on it barely 12 hours after the text was released,” Rep. Frank Lucas (R-Okla.), ranking member of the House Science Committee, said in a statement. “What’s more, by stripping this NASA bill and replacing it with an attempt to impose federal control of elections, they have killed our only vehicle to extend NASA’s authority to lease out underutilized property and save taxpayer money.”

NASA’s EUL authority lapsed Dec. 31, meaning that the agency cannot enter into new leases until that authority is renewed. NASA had signed leases for 65 properties as of 2019, which provided the agency with nearly $11 million in revenue that went to support other facility improvements.

It’s unclear what the next step is for restoring NASA’s EUL authority. A Senate bill introduced in December proposed a two-year extension, but that bill remains in the Senate Commerce Committee.

“We hope and expect to pass an EUL extension in future legislation,” Aaron Fritschner, spokesman for Rep. Beyer, told SpaceNews Jan. 13 after the House vote, but details on how to do so were still being worked out.

 

Sinema Kills Biden’s Election Power-Grab Scheme Just as He Arrives on Capitol Hill to Push It

Despite all of President Biden’s blustering fire-and-brimstone doomsday talk about evil Republicans — who are simply operating within the Senate’s established rules — it was a Democrat Senator who on Thursday delivered a mortal blow to the White House’s latest attempt to secure a legislative victory on so-called “voting rights.”

Arizona Democrat Senator Kyrsten Sinema took to the Senate floor on Thursday afternoon to once again explain why the 60-vote threshold to stop a legislative filibuster is both necessary and not worth upending for a temporary wish.

Demonstrating more foresight than the late Harry Reid or current Senate Majority Chuck Schumer demonstrated, Sinema declared that “eliminating the 60-vote threshold will simply guarantee that we lose a critical tool that we need to safeguard our democracy from threats in the years to come.” Ending the legislative filibuster in order to force through Democrats’ radical federal takeover of elections is something Sinema said would “worsen the underlying disease of division infecting our country.”

“The debate over the Senate’s 60-vote threshold shines a light on our broader challenges,” Sinema continued in her floor speech. “There’s no need for me to restate my longstanding support for the 60-vote threshold to pass legislation. There’s no need for me to restate its role protecting our country from wild reversals in federal policy.”

As Vespa covered earlier in January, Sinema’s opposition to getting rid of the legislative filibuster as a tool to ensure broad support for new federal policies has been made clear. And despite Senator Sinema’s detractors who allege she’s being bought off or somewhat manipulated into opposing an overhaul of the process for passing legislative through the Senate, she made clear on Thursday that her support for the legislative filibuster is longstanding, even while she was in the House.

“It is a view I’ve held during my years serving in both the U.S. House and the Senate, and it is the view that I continue to hold,” Sinema explained. “It is the belief that I have shared many times in public settings, and in private settings. Senators of both parties have offered ideas — including some that would earn my support — to make this body more productive, more deliberative, more responsive to Americans’ needs, and a place of genuine debate about our country’s pressing issues,” Sinema said reiterating her point that she’s not opposed to certain changes in how the Senate operates. But when it comes to the legislative filibuster, it’s a non-starter for Sinema.

“A discussion of rules falls short of what is required,” she explained of the current attempt by Schumer to shatter Senate norms. “American politics are cyclical, and the granting of power in Washington, D.C. is exchanged regularly by voters from one party to another. The shift of power back and forth means the Senate’s 60-vote threshold has proved maddening to members of both political parties in recent years,” she reminded.

“Used either as a weapon of obstruction or as a safety net to save the country from radical policies, depending on whether you serve in the majority or the minority,” Sinema said. “What is the legislative filibuster other than a tool that requires new federal policy to be broadly supported by senators representing a broader cross section of Americans — a guardrail.”

With her floor speech, Senator Sinema effectively ended Schumer’s hopes of changing the rules to allow President Biden’s latest legislative priority to pass. It also proved that Biden’s speech on his election overhaul priority was a total fail.

It turns out that Biden’s hollering about anyone who opposes passing the federal election takeover being equal to the president of the confederacy does not in fact change minds. In making her consistent stance clear on the Senate floor, Sinema has likely handed the White House and congressional Democrat leadership another defeat as the new year begins.

The gun grabbers used to continually squeal that there would be ‘Wild West Pimp Style Shootout Blood Flowing In The Streets!™’ when concealed carry permit laws were being passed during the last 30+ years.
Now that that has been shown to be absolute BS, they’re trying the same old playbook out with permitless carry.
It’s all they have, and everyone should know by now, from the lack of that ‘Wild West Pimp Style Shootout Blood Flowing In The Streets!™’ in the states that have passed permitless carry, that it’s still absolute BS

The weakest argument yet against Constitutional Carry?

Ohio lawmakers have approved two separate Constitutional Carry bills in recent weeks, but neither have received the final votes needed to be sent to Gov. Mike DeWine for his signature, and while the bills are still sitting in the state capitol building opponents have been trying to muster up enough last-minute opposition to derail the legislation from becoming law.

There’ve been no shortage of op-eds and opinion pieces proclaiming that Ohio will become the “Wild, Wild West” or descend into a dystopian hellscape if the state no longer requires a government-issued permission slip before legal gun owners can lawfully carry, but one of the weakest arguments I’ve run across came from retired attorney former law professor Doug Rogers, who seems to believe that the state’s current laws are actually preventing criminals from illegally carrying a gun.

The Fraternal Order of Police of Ohio testified that Senate Bill 215 will “create a threat to officer safety.”

Hamilton County Sheriff Charmaine McGuffey testified: “Allowing virtually anyone in Ohio to conceal weapons on their person without training or background checks will make Ohio less safe.”

The Ohio Patrolmen’s Benevolent Association testified, “There must be a minimum training requirement for someone … with the awesome right of carrying a weapon that can deprive another person of their life.”

Ohio already allows for the open carrying of firearms without a license or training, and there’s no minimum training requirement to own a firearm either. How is carrying a firearm concealed so much different from openly carrying one? While I strongly encourage every gun owner to continually train with their gun, mandating an official training course before one can exercise a constitutionally-protected right is an undue burden on the right itself.

Rogers goes on to complain about several other aspects of the bill, including language that clarifies when someone who’s legally armed needs to inform a law enforcement officer of that fact.

Finally, the senate bill would further endanger police by: (1) eliminating the current responsibility of a civilian carrying a concealed handgun stopped by the police to promptly notify police that he is carrying a concealed firearm; and (2) switching the duty to the police officer to ask if that civilian is carrying a concealed weapon.

The Ohio Association of Chiefs of Police said, “To remove the duty to notify is setting us all up for confrontation and potentially tragic failure.”

I’d argue that the current ambiguous language is even more likely to lead to confrontation and potential tragedy. With the clear standard outlined in the permitless carry legislation, an officer can simply ask an individual if they’re carrying a firearm when they initiate the stop. I think that’s a much better solution than leaving it up to the gun owner to “promptly” (a term which isn’t defined in state law) notify police themselves.

There are 21 states with permitless carry laws on the books, and police departments in every one of them have figured out how to continue to do their job and arrest violent criminals after the law took effect. No state has ever gone back and repealed its Constitutional Carry statute, which also says quite a bit about how the law actually works in practice.

Rogers wraps up his lame argument by calling on the legislature to reject Constitutional carry “because it is anti-police and anti-public safety,” which is an outright lie. There’s nothing anti-police about a pro-civil rights piece of legislation. There’s nothing anti-public safety about ensuring that legal gun owners can publicly protect themselves. Frankly, there’s no good reason why Ohio shouldn’t join the 21 other states that have already adopted Constitutional Carry. The bills are there and now’s the time for lawmakers in Columbus to move this legislation across the finish line and send it to the governor for his signature.

Man Who Bought Gun for Kyle Rittenhouse Pleads ‘No Contest’

Dominick Black, the man who bought the rifle Kyle Rittenhouse carried and used in Kenosha, Wisconsin, on August 25, 2020, is pleading “no contest” to “contributing to the delinquency of a minor.”

The Associated Press notes Black purchased the rifle when he was 18 and Rittenhouse was 17. (At 17 years of age, Rittenhouse was too young to purchase the rifle.)

On November 9, 2020, ABC 7 reported Black was arrested and placed in jail for allegedly buying the rifle for Rittenhouse.

ABC 7 cites an affidavit claiming Black allegedly took money from Rittenhouse, “then on May 1st he drove 300 miles north from Kenosha to a hardware store in upper Wisconsin to buy the [AR-15].”

The AP observed that the case against Black was weakened once Judge Bruce Schroeder, during the Rittenhouse trial, agreed to drop the charge that Rittenhouse possessed his rifle illegally at age 17.

On Friday, Black pleaded “no contest” to “contributing to the delinquency of a minor,” which is “non-criminal.” If Judge Schroder accepts the plea, Black will pay a $2,000 fine and all felony charges will be dropped.

Maybe instead of ‘aspire’, they can all go ‘expire’.

A Year In, President Biden’s Bold Gun Reform Agenda Remains Largely Aspirational
Gun reform advocates who supported Biden have been frustrated by the president’s failure to get any significant reform legislation through a Democratic Congress…………..

Leaders of major gun reform groups predicted that his first year in office, with Democrats also controlling Congress, would be an unprecedented period of progress. Now Democrats are expected to take losses in the House and Senate midterm elections — and Biden could be running out of time. (yippee!)

Biden’s voodoo crime control: Americans have more reason to own a gun than ever before

President Biden has returned to an old standby for liberal crime fighters — more gun control.

This month, the president used the anniversary of the Sandy Hook shootings to push gun-control legislation that included expanded background checks and $5 billion for community “anti-violence programs.” He assured us that all were “commonsense” measures.

Funny how new gun control proposals are always commonsensical. Whatever background checks we have, they always need to be expanded. Giving money to community programs (read: social spending) is one of the left’s favorite anti-crime measures.

Crime has reached epidemic proportions, and not just crimes committed with guns. Property theft is up. (A new expression has been added to the vocabulary — “snatch and grab.”) The elderly are assaulted on city streets. Women are raped on train cars. The murder of police officers has become routine.

In 2021, 12 major cities, all with Democratic mayors, had record-breaking homicides.

As of Dec. 17, there were 535 murders in Philadelphia, exceeding the previous record of 500 in 1990. Portland, St. Paul and Chicago were among the other winners of the homicide sweepstakes.

To all of this, the Democrats have a set of standard responses — deny, deflect and play dumb.

Earlier this month, Larry Krasner (“Let ‘em Loose Larry”), Philly’s radical district attorney, said there wasn’t an overall crisis of crime in the City of Brotherly Love. (“Basically, we don’t have a crisis of lawlessness. We don’t have a crisis of crime. We don’t have a crisis of violence.”) Mr. Krasner later tried to walk it back, to still the uproarious laughter.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi confessed, “The fact is there is an attitude of lawlessness in our country that springs from I don’t know where.”

Her feigned ignorance is understandable.

The crime wave washing over our cities is due to policies and causes championed by her party and her “just perfect” president — including defunding and demonizing the police, ending cash bail, reducing felonies to misdemeanors, loosening borders and allowing the mob free-rein during last year’s riots.

As business districts went up in flames, police were attacked and stores were looted, Democratic officeholders either ignored the mob or cheered it on. Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey helpfully observed: “Yes, America is burning, but that’s how forests grow.” Chaos in the streets is also how totalitarian movements grow, like the Bolsheviks in 1917 and the Nazis in 1933.

As a candidate, Mr. Biden avoided commenting on the orgy of violence until polls showed him losing on the issue. Even then, he repudiated it only in the most general terms, never mentioning BLM or antifa.

The president’s open-borders debacle — stopping construction of the wall, ending remain-in-Mexico (recently reinstated by the courts), and bringing back catch and release — also contributed to the crime wave.

In the past fiscal year, the number of border encounters quadrupled over 2020. We’re not just importing poverty and disease, but gang members, drugs and human trafficking.

But the president says we can end the crime explosion with expanded background checks and midnight basketball.

Background checks are useless. The Sandy Hook shooter used his mother’s legally registered gun. The San Bernardino terrorists used a straw-man purchase to get their weapons. The 15-year-old arrested for the school shooting in Oxford, Michigan, used his parents’ legal handgun. According to the Department of Justice, 1.4 million guns are stolen in this country each year. Perhaps we could do background checks on the thieves.

Gun control is voodoo crime control. It won’t keep guns out of the hands of determined criminals or psychopaths.

We are a nation of gun owners and have been from the beginning. The American Revolution started when the British tried to impose commonsense gun control at Lexington and Concord.

In a September Pew Research Poll, 4 in 10 Americans said they live in a household with a gun, including 30% who said they personally own one. The percentage used in a crime each year is infinitesimal (.004%).

Thank God for guns. Widespread gun ownership is one reason we’ve never had a Stalin, a Hitler or a Castro.

Ironically, Mr. Biden seeks to impose more gun control at a time when his policies give Americans more of a reason to own guns than ever before.

Nebraska state senator to try again to allow ‘constitutional carry’ of handguns

Sen. Tom Brewer, a decorated veteran who knows something about overcoming adversity, is loading up another effort to obtain a victory that has eluded gun-rights advocates in Nebraska.

Brewer said he will introduce a proposal during the upcoming legislative session to allow Nebraskans to carry a concealed handgun without meeting the current requirements of a criminal background check, a $100 fee and an eight- to 16-hour class on safe gun handling.

Constitutional carry — which refers to the belief that the U.S. Constitution already gives people the right to carry concealed guns — is a hot-button issue that has previously failed in the Nebraska Legislature. But it’s the law in 21 states, including every state surrounding Nebraska except Colorado.

As of Nov. 1, there were more than 85,671 Nebraskans licensed to carry concealed weapons.

Earlier this year, Brewer abandoned a proposal that would have allowed Nebraska counties, with the exception of the three largest — Douglas, Lancaster and Sarpy — to decide whether to allow permit-less carry of concealed handguns. Brewer’s decision came after a Nebraska attorney general’s opinion raised serious constitutional concerns about delegating a state matter to county boards.

But Brewer, who represents Nebraska’s traditionally conservative Sandhills, got a boost recently from Gov. Pete Ricketts.

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DEMAND CREDIBLE ANSWERS
MAKE THE POLITICIANS JUSTIFY GUN CONTROL

How many times have you heard or read this: “If people shouldn’t need photo ID to vote, why should it be required to buy a gun?”

Too many left-tilting reporters and politicians quickly dismiss this question as redneck rhetoric, but don’t let them get away with such dismissive condescension. It is a legitimate question because we’re not talking about guns, we’re talking about rights and all constitutionally protected rights are equal, especially the ones enumerated in the federal and state constitutions.

All Are Equal

The right to keep and bear arms may be treated like the ugly second-cousin at a family picnic but it is just as important and deserving of respect as the rights of free speech, the press, religion, the presence of legal counsel during police interrogation and the right to an attorney when prosecuted in a court of law.

So, you bet this is a question politicians should answer and not with some song-and-dance response that doesn’t really answer your inquiry. Don’t let them get away with it.

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Indiana Republicans reintroducing legislation to end requirement for handgun carry permits

INDIANAPOLIS – Indiana Republican lawmakers are working to reintroduce legislation that would allow many Hoosiers to carry handguns without a permit.

Several lawmakers in both the Indiana House and Senate are writing bills.

Known as “constitutional carry” or “permitless carry,” it’s a change to Indiana law some Republican legislators have been working on for years.

“It’s still to me, it’s an infringement of our constitutional rights to mandate, require somebody to jump through hoops, go get fingerprinted, pay a fee – you still have to pay to get your fingerprints done – wait God only knows how long,” said State Rep. Jim Lucas (R-Seymour), one of the lawmakers planning to introduce this type of bill.

It would still prevent anyone not allowed to carry a gun now from doing so, Lucas said.

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BLUF:
They are fearful and angry not because democracy doesn’t work, but because it does, despite their own media and political efforts to warp it.

When a party is hijacked by radicals and uses almost any means necessary to gain and use power for agendas that few Americans support, then average voters express their disapproval.

That reality apparently terrifies an elite. It then claims any system that allows the people to vote against the left is not “people power” at all.

Why Is the Left Suddenly Worried About the End of Democracy?

What is behind recent pessimistic appraisals of democracy’s future, from Hillary Clinton, Adam Schiff, Brian Williams, and other elite intellectuals, media personalities, and politicians on the left? Some are warning about its possible erosion in 2024. Others predict democracy’s downturn as early 2022, with scary scenarios of “autocracy” and Trump “coups.”

To answer that question, understand first what isn’t behind these shrill forecasts.

They are not worried about 2 million foreign nationals crashing the border in a single year, without vaccinations during a pandemic. Yet it seems insurrectionary for a government simply to nullify its own immigration laws.

They are not worried that some 800,000 foreign nationals, some residing illegally, will now vote in New York City elections.

They are not worried that there are formal efforts underway to dismantle the U.S. Constitution by junking the 233-year-old Electoral College or the preeminence of the states in establishing ballot laws in national elections.

They are not worried that we are witnessing an unprecedented left-wing effort to scrap the 180-year-old filibuster, the 150-year-old nine-person Supreme Court, and the 60-year tradition of 50 states, for naked political advantage.

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What Questions Should Second Amendment Supporters Ask Candidates For State Offices?

Second Amendment supporters should be familiar with the federalist structure that was established by the Constitution. In many ways, it has proven to be a very robust bulwark to protect our Second Amendment rights. Yes, the situation may suck in some of them, but the damage has been limited compared to what happened to gun owners in places like England, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand.

In 2022, Second Amendment supporters have a chance to strengthen the defenses of the Second Amendment. Most states will be electing governors (and other statewide offices), and almost all will elect state legislatures. The stakes are high, and it will be crucial to ask candidates for office the right questions to avoid disappointments like Larry Hogan.

We can start with people running for state legislatures. These are races where grassroots efforts can make a big difference, especially in primary elections.

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Report: Florida on Track to Become 22nd Constitutional Carry State

A report by the South Florida Sun Sentinel suggests Florida is on track to become the 22nd constitutional carry state.

Constitutional carry is a “priority” for the Republican-led Florida legislature, the Sentinel reported.

Rep. Anthony Sabatini (R) has already introduced legislation to do away with the concealed carry permit requirement for Floridians. Open carry without a permit would also be legalized by Sabatini’s bill.

Moreover, Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) has already made it clear he will sign constitutional carry legislation, should it reach his desk.

Florida Gun Rights’ Matt Collins posted a video online asking DeSantis, “If constitutional carry made your desk, would you sign it?”

DeSantis responded, “Of course.”

There are currently 21 constitutional carry states in the U.S. Those states are Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, Idaho, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Maine, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Vermont, West Virginia, and Wyoming.

Moving steadily along

[Ohio]Senate votes to allow concealed carry of guns without training or background checks

The Ohio Senate passed legislation Wednesday that will allow any Ohioans 21 and older to carry a concealed weapon, so long as they’re allowed to possess it under state and federal law.

Currently, Ohioans must pass a background check and demonstrate proof of eight hours of training to obtain a concealed carry license. Senate Bill 215 nixes these guardrails, along with a requirement that armed people “promptly” inform police officers that they’re carrying a concealed weapon during a stop.

All Senate Republicans, minus Sen. Jerry Cirino, R-Kirtland, voted for the legislation. Democrats opposed the bill.

Both the House and Senate have now passed separate but similar versions of “constitutional carry” or “permitless carry” legislation, as it’s commonly known. Lawmakers will have to agree on a final version to send to Gov. Mike DeWine.

A DeWine spokesman said Wednesday the governor is reviewing the bill and noted he has “long supported the Second Amendment rights of law-abiding citizens to keep and bear arms.”

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OOPS

Liz Cheney, Daily Beast Tout ‘Bombshell’ Texts That Actually Prove There Was No Insurrection.

The Leftist political and media establishment now takes for granted that on Jan. 6, Donald Trump attempted a coup, with his slavish minions storming the Capitol and threatening the very survival of our free institutions. The only thing they haven’t been able to do is to prove it, even with a vindictive round of impeachment proceedings conducted after Trump left office and an endless round of somnambulant Jan. 6 insurrection hearings in a House committee.

So it was understandable that the far-Left propaganda organ the Daily Beast was thrilled Monday when Rep. Liz Cheney (R-NeverTrump) revealed numerous texts sent to Trump Chief of Staff Mark Meadows on Jan. 6, begging Trump to tell the people who had entered the Capitol to desist. They got him now, right? After years of the Russian collusion hoax and Stalinist show trial impeachment proceedings, they finally got him! Well, no. In fact, the texts Cheney revealed prove definitively that there was no Jan. 6 insurrection at all.

The Daily Beast gives Cheney’s revelations the biggest possible buildup: “A bombshell dropped in Monday night’s Jan. 6 committee hearing when it was revealed that Donald Trump Jr.—along with Fox News stars including Sean Hannity and Laura Ingraham—begged White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows to get the president to make a national address and halt the Capitol riot.” The unspoken corollary is that Trump paid no heed to these appeals from some of his most fervent supporters because he secretly or not-so-secretly supported the “insurrection.”

At first glance, it does look damning. Donald Trump Jr. texted Meadows: “He’s got to condemn this s**t ASAP. The Capitol Police tweet is not enough.” And then: “We need an Oval Office address. He has to lead now. It has gone too far and gotten out of hand.” Hannity texted in the same vein: “Can he make a statement. Ask people to leave the Capitol.” Ingraham wrote: “Mark, the president needs to tell people in the Capitol to go home. This is hurting all of us. He is destroying his legacy.” Fox & Friends’ Brian Kilmeade chimed in: “Please, get him on TV. Destroying everything you have accomplished.”

The Daily Beast does not bother to inform its unfortunate readers that Trump, far from orchestrating an insurrection, actually heeded these calls and issued a video statement just after 4 p.m.:

 

I know your pain. I know you’re hurt. I know you’re hurt, I know your pain. I know you’re hurt. We had an election that was stolen from us. It was a landslide election and everyone knows it, especially the other side. But you have to go home now. We have to have peace. We have to have law and order. We have to respect our great people in law and order. We don’t want anybody hurt. It’s a very tough period of time.

There’s never been a time like this where such a thing happened where they could take it away from all of us, from me, from you, from our country. This was a fraudulent election. But we can’t play into the hands of these people. We have to have peace. So go home, we love you. You’re very special. You’ve seen what happens. You see the way others are treated that are so bad and so evil. I know how you feel, but go home and go home at peace.

This statement only enraged the Left, because in it Trump continued to charge that the election was stolen, which the establishment media insists is a false claim. But Trump’s statement is also unequivocal in telling the people at the Capitol on Jan. 6 to disperse peacefully; that’s hardly what one would expect from the leader of an insurrection. What’s more, it strains credulity that Trump would have been planning an “insurrection” on Jan. 6 but that his son, one of his closest confidantes, would not have known about it, and that it would have caught his top supporters in the media completely by surprise.

The bottom line is that Donald Trump Jr. and others texted Mark Meadows asking him to get Trump to make a statement pacifying the situation on Jan. 6, and Trump did so. This very simply and clearly proves that there was no insurrection at all and that the House’s Jan. 6 committee should make a statement to that effect and end its proceedings. But of course, its real purpose is to prevent Trump from being able to run again in 2024, and in pursuit of that goal, it will be with us for a long time to come.

NY State Lawmaker Thinks Constitutionality Is Irrelevant

When a law is challenged in court, what’s really being challenged is whether that law is constitutional or not. The constitutionality of any given law is something we should always be questioning. Just because we think it may yield some benefit or not is irrelevant. What matters is whether that law should exist within the framework the Founding Fathers provided.

However, it seems that some people don’t really believe that.

One such person got to write their opinion at Newsweek:

Kyle Rittenhouse’s recent acquittal portends a dire future: one in which anyone can bring a loaded weapon anywhere, and where daily encounters can turn into deadly shootouts within seconds. Luckily, states are free to regulate the concealed carry of weapons, while balancing the rights granted by the Second Amendment. But right now, the Supreme Court is considering a case that could have sweeping implications for the safety of my constituents and many other Americans. In New York State Rifle & Pistol Association Inc. v. Bruen, the Court must grapple with the very real tensions between public safety and constitutional rights.

…

Many gun regulations, like so much else in our legal system, do have a racist and anti-immigrant origin story and are frequently applied unequally to people of color. But my state’s concealed-carry permit law comports with a long, if imperfect, history and tradition of regulating guns in public spaces. Conservative justices have long held these traditions sacrosanct when interpreting the Second Amendment. It remains to be seen whether this fealty to history comes from a genuinely held belief, or is simply a convenient means to an end. Regardless of how the Court rules, my colleagues and I stand ready to continue legislating in the best interest of the communities we represent. As one of the people closest to this problem, I believe elected officials like me should be closest to crafting the solution.

In other words, this New York state lawmaker believes that he and his colleagues should be free to pass whatever laws they want and the courts should give deference to their decisions rather than consider the constitutionality of those laws.

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Another demoncrap scheme falls flat on its face.

Biden judicial commission approves final report, avoids recommendation on expanding Supreme Court
Commission’s decision to make no recommendation likely to upset liberals who called for adding justices after confirmation of Justice Amy Coney Barrett

President Joe Biden’s Supreme Court commission unanimously approved Tuesday a final report that pointedly declined to make recommendations on the most controversial ideas offered by liberals such as expanding the number of justices.

“The commission takes no position on the validity or strength” of arguments for or against increasing the number of justices, an idea often called packing the court, the final report noted.

While avoiding a recommendation, the panel noted most serious scholars opposed court packing.

“No serious person, in either major political party, suggests court packing as a means of overturning disliked Supreme Court decisions, whether the decision in question is Roe v. Wade or Citizens United,” the final report said.

”Scholars could say, until very recently, that even as compared to other court reform efforts, ‘court-packing’ is especially out of bounds. This is part of the convention of judicial independence.”

The 34-member commission’s 288-page report is likely to disappoint liberals, who called for adding justices after the confirmation of Trump-appointee Justice Amy Coney Barrett.

Biden created the commission in April to study expanding the court. He proposed the commission as a 2020 presidential candidate, when the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg and the swift confirmation of then-President Donald Trump’s nominee in the final weeks of the presidential election led many progressives to urge Biden to consider expanding the number of justices.

Biden, a former chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, has not publicly embraced such a move.

The commission, made up of more than two dozen experts, also reviewed structural changes to the court like term limits and reducing the power of the federal judiciary, NBC reports.

Florida Governor DeSantis Signals Support for Permitless Gun Carry

Florida may soon become the next permitless gun-carry state.

Republican Governor Ron DeSantis indicated he supports eliminating the permit requirement for concealed carry in Florida. When asked by a gun-rights activist at a private event, he said he would sign a bill to that end if one made it to his desk.

“Of course,” DeSantis said in a video made public on Tuesday.

Christina Pushaw, a spokesperson for the governor, said the video accurately represents his position. However, she noted the governor would need to see the details of an actual bill before commenting further.

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Supposing, of course, that the prognosticaations of a massive demoncrap loss actually occur…..

What Will A Post-2022 Congress Be Able To Do?

One thing Second Amendment supporters need to have in mind is what they should push for after the 2022 elections. Now, there is a lot of time between now and 2022, but based on what happened in Virginia and some other trends, it is shaping up to go very nicely for those who support the Second Amendment.

But what is to be done with what could be a pro-Second Amendment majority in the House and Senate? While Joe Biden will still have a veto pen, it doesn’t mean that Second Amendment supporters will be without options.

One could say that there is a Second Amendment supportive majority in the United States, given that all 50 Republicans and Joe Manchin, Angus King, and Jon Tester have made pro-Second Amendment votes at times. However, currently, the Senate Majority Leader is Chuck Schumer, and Schumer is making Second Amendment supporters miss having Mitch McConnell in that position.

So, what changes when Congressional leadership is pro-Second Amendment. The biggest changes will be in oversight and spending. Here, they can help prevent things like Operation Chokepoint and also put the halt to funding for anti-Second Amendment propaganda from the Centers for Disease Control. In addition, Congressional oversight could also be a way to shine the light on corporate gun control and put the heat on the CEOs.

The other thing they will do is block a lot of anti-Second Amendment legislation via a numbers game and control of the committees in the House and Senate. Now, given pro-Second Amendment legislation will not be signed into law by Biden and getting the veto-proof majorities will be highly unlikely, but just blocking anti-Second Amendment legislation at the federal level will protect our rights, especially in a post-NYSRPA v. Bruen world.

It won’t just be anti-Second Amendment legislation that will be killed if Second Amendment supporters take control of Congress. Various other attacks on our rights will also be halted, like the For the People Act and other campaign finance “reform” schemes. That will allow Second Amendment supporters to make their case to the American people, and when we are able to make that case, we win the arguments.

For the potential gains in the 2022 midterms to happen, though, Second Amendment supporters will have a lot of work to do. They need to defeat anti-Second Amendment extremists at the federal, state, and local levels via the ballot box.