The Washington Examiner recently reported that Presidential hopeful and Democratic frontrunner, Bernie Sanders, made the following statement while running for governor in 1972: “I don’t mind people coming up and calling me a communist.”
During the Reagan era, Sanders even campaigned for self-described Trotskyites, a Marxist sect that openly calls for violent revolutions.
Sanders’ involvement with the Socialist Workers Party raised so many suspicions that he was even investigated by the FBI.
Should this concern Americans?
On January 10, 1963, less than 10 years before the Senator from Vermont owned the label of “Communist,” Democrat Congressman Albert Sydney Herlong, Jr.,read into the Congressional Record the 45 Communist goals for America, which included No. 28:
“Eliminate prayer or any phase of religious expression in the schools on the ground that it violates the principle of ‘separation of church and state.’“
With so much misunderstanding regarding the phrase “wall of separation between church and state,” it is helpful to review opinions of past Supreme Court Justices.
This Act is known and may be cited as the “Louisiana Constitutional Carry Act of 2020
Abstract: Exempts certain persons from the crime of illegal carrying of weapons, and
removes the requirement that a person possess a permit issued by the state of La. in
order to carry a concealed handgun in the state of La.
Present law (R.S. 14:95) prohibits the carrying of a concealed firearm, provides for criminal
penalties, and provides for certain exceptions to the offense.
Proposed law creates an exception to this prohibition for any person who did not illegally
obtain nor manufacture the firearm and who is not prohibited from possessing a firearm
under any state or federal law.
A brawl broke out at a Bernie Sanders rally in Colorado on Sunday when a supporter of the Vermont senator confronted another man for wearing a T-shirt that read “Black Guns Matter,” a report said.
The man sporting the shirt, who is black, told CBS Denver that he was recording the presidential hopeful at the Colorado Convention Center when another rally attendee called him “racist” because of his shirt.
“He had a problem with the shirt I was wearing,” the man, who was not identified, told the news station.
“I was recording the event, he walks up and calls me a racist. But I thought, ‘What’s he know about black lives, about discrimination, or, for that matter, the representation of the shirt.’”
At some point during the confrontation, the two men began wrestling and the scuffle spilled over a metal barrier that separated the crowd from the stage, video captured by the news channel shows.
The Bernie bro told CBS Denver that the fight escalated when he heard the other man booing Sanders.
The Sanders supporter, who told the station his name is Tyler, claimed the T-shirt-wearing man knocked his cellphone out of his hand and attacked him.
He then retaliated and wrestled with him as the senator spoke, he told the station.
But the man wearing the shirt — who says he agrees with Sanders on some policies, but not on gun control — said he was shocked at being physically confronted at a political rally.
“I think it’s really a sad thing at a Bernie rally, when someone has a difference of opinion, that someone would be treated like that,” he told CBS Denver.
“I thought it really would be a lot more inclusive than that. It’s not a safe place to express differences.”
He added: “I would expect that sort of thing at a Trump rally.”
demoncraps have been trying to claim that President Donald Trump is improperly inserting himself in DOJ cases, like the one on Roger Stone.
Cue the last meme about hypocrisy.
Harvard Law School professor emeritus Alan Dershowitz revealed in an interview on Sunday that he has proof that former Democrat President Barack Obama ordered the FBI to investigate someone after far-left billionaire George Soros asked for the investigation.
Dershowitz’s remarks come after critics have attacked President Donald Trump for tweeting about matters related to the Department of Justice, which led to Attorney General William Barr publicly asking the president to stop last week.
“There was a lot of White House control of the Justice Department during the Kennedy administration and I don’t think we saw very many liberal professors arguing against that,” Dershowitz told Breitbart News. “I have some information as well about the Obama administration – which will be disclosed in a lawsuit at some point, but I’m not prepared to disclose it now – about how President Obama personally asked the FBI to investigate somebody on behalf of George Soros, who was a close ally of his.”
“We’ve seen this kind of White House influence on the Justice Department virtually in every Justice Department,” Dershowitz continued. “The difference this president is much more overt about it, he tweets about it. President Obama whispered to the Justice Department about it.”
“You said that George Soros asked Barack Obama to have his Justice Department investigate somebody?” Breitbart News pressed.
“That’s going to come out in a lawsuit in the near future, yeah,” Dershowitz responded. “I have in my possession the actual 302 form which documents this issue and it will at the right time come out, but I’m not free to disclose it now because it’s a case that’s not yet been filed.”
Sen. Chris Murphy of Connecticut and other Democratic senators had a secret meeting with Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif during the Munich Security Conference last week, according to a source briefed by the French delegation to the conference. Murphy’s office did not respond to repeated requests for comment by press time.
Such a meeting would mean Murphy had done the type of secret coordination with foreign leaders to potentially undermine the U.S. government that he accused Trump officials of doing as they prepared for Trump’s administration. In February 2017, Murphy demanded investigations of National Security Advisor Mike Flynn because he had a phone call with his counterpart-to-be in Russia.
“Any effort to undermine our nation’s foreign policy – even during a transition period – may be illegal and must be taken seriously,” Murphy said in 2017 after anonymous leaks of Flynn’s phone call with Russian ambassador Sergey Kisylak were published. He also strongly criticized the open letter some Republican senators sent Iranian leaders during the Obama administration’s campaign for a nuclear agreement.
However, Murphy has previously defended rogue meetings if they’re done by Democrats such as former Secretary of State John Kerry.
“Unless it was authorized by the president or secretary of state, conducting independent foreign policy sends mixed signals to our adversaries,” said Christian Whiton, former State Department senior advisor in the Trump and George W. Bush administrations. “It seems very unpalatable. If we want to talk to Iranians, they know how to reach us and they don’t need to go through an intermediary.”
A State Department official who spoke on background said that the State Department was not aware of any side meetings with Iranian officials that Murphy was engaged in.
The Munich Security Conference, an annual forum on international security policy, welcomes hundreds of world leaders each February. This year’s conference featured robust debate on the United States’ maximum pressure policy against Iran, China’s handling of the coronavirus and technology concerns, and the European alliance with the United States. Other Democrat senators at the conference included Sens. Robert Menendez of New Jersey and Chris Van Hollen of Maryland. Former Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts also attended.
Both Murphy and Zarif spoke publicly during a two-hour session on Middle East policy, with Murphy and Zarif both fiercely criticizing U.S. policy.
President Donald Trump has reoriented American policy in the Middle East away from President Barack Obama’s friendly posture toward Iran. He departed from Obama’s Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, a nuclear arrangement with the Republic of Iran that was not ratified by the United States Senate.
Trump has exerted instead a “maximum pressure” campaign against the regime, with 12 demands on Iran before a new deal is reached. Those demands include a full account of its nuclear program, ending its proliferation of ballistic missiles, releasing all U.S. citizens held on spurious charges, ending support to terrorist groups, withdrawal of forces in Syria, and cessation of its threatening behavior against its neighbors.
The “maximum pressure” campaign of sanctions has devastated the Iranian economy, which is in recession and faces rising inflation. It has made it difficult for Iran to pay foreign fighters engaged in supported terror operations. Iranians have taken to the streets in protest.
Iran recently killed an American contractor in Iraq and the United States killed Iranian general Qassim Suleimani, a top Iranian leader who was responsible for the killing and maiming of thousands of U.S. soldiers. Iran’s retaliatory strike for that killing resulted in no U.S. deaths, but the country did shoot down a Ukrainian passenger plane then lied about it for days.
At the conference, Zarif said official retaliation for the killing of Suleimani had ended, although he suggested independent attacks from others in the country might follow.
Murphy is a frequentspeaker at the National Iranian American Council, a lobbying group with alleged links to the Islamic Republic of Iran. Republican Sens. Mike Braun of Indiana, Tom Cotton of Arkansas, and Ted Cruz of Texas recently asked the Department of Justice for potential violations of the Foreign Agents Registration Act.
They wrote that the influential lobbying group “purports to improve understanding between American and Iranian people but in reality seems to spread propaganda and lobby on behalf of the Iranian government.” Evidence indicates that evidence Zarif himself was involved in founding the group.
We enter 2020 secure in the knowledge that the Texas Legislature has our back on gun rights. If you want proof, look no further than the 10 bills that went into effect last year.
The law now gives you a defense of “mistake.” Everyone knows that it is fairly easy to miss a posted sign that states handguns are prohibited on a premises. Under the old law, the lawful handgun carrier could be prosecuted for such a mistake. Now, the handgun carrier has a defense if he or she promptly leaves after being told that handguns are forbidden on the premises.
Has your landlord been giving you trouble about your lawfully possessed firearm?
That is a remnant of the past. Landlords and condominium regimes can no longer prohibit tenants, owners and their guests from possessing lawful firearms and ammunition in apartments, condominiums and manufactured houses, nor can they prohibit transporting the firearms and ammo between their unit and their vehicles.
Some schools still have a lot to learn. Handgun license holders have always been allowed to store firearms and ammo out of sight in a locked vehicle in a school parking lot, but some schools were putting additional rules in place. Those rules are no longer permitted.
Is there anything more irritating than having to leave your handguns behind during a mandatory evacuation just because you do not have a permit to carry? Apparently not. As long as you are not prohibited by law from carrying a handgun, you can now carry it while evacuating or reentering an area within 168 hours after the area was declared a state of disaster.
A few misguided government agencies were not wild about the idea of legal handgun carry in their buildings, so they put up the premises notices.
Your legislators were not amused. They passed a law providing for a 15-day notice to remove the signs.
Foster parents now have the right to possess and store lawfully permitted firearms and ammunition in the foster home. Some restrictions apply.
What are we to do with local governments who think they know better than the great State of Texas? Sigh. The law now clarifies that municipalities cannot adopt regulations that attempt to modify state law regarding firearms, knives, ammunition and the like.
It is now law that a business cannot be sued because it fails to prohibit legal handgun carry on its premises.
Any law that places a restriction on property owners’ associations is a good law. The legislature tossed their right to restrict you from lawful possession, storage or transport of a firearm or ammunition.
And for the grand finale – this was recently in the news and deserves special mention. A place of worship is now treated the same as any other private property for purposes of deciding whether a license holder may carry on premises.
This week, several anti-gun bills received floor votes and passed out of their respective chambers. Additionally, two bills have now been pulled from the House Rules Committee and are eligible for a vote at any time. Please contact your Representative and ask them to oppose House Bills 2240 and 2623!
The following two bills have been pulled from Rules Committee and are awaiting a floor vote:
House Bill 2240 bans the manufacture, possession, sale, transfer, etc. of magazines that hold more than fifteen rounds of ammunition. This bill is strongly supported by the Governor and the Attorney General. These so called “high capacity” magazines are in fact standard equipment for commonly-owned firearms that many Americans legally and effectively use for an entire range of legitimate purposes, such as self-defense or competition. Those who own non-compliant magazines prior to the ban are only allowed to possess them on their own property and in other limited instances such as at licensed shooting ranges or while hunting. Restricted magazines have to be transported unloaded and locked separately from firearms and stored at home locked, making them unavailable for self-defense. Anti-gun legislators are attempting to bringHB 2240 up for a floor vote on Sunday.
House Bill 2623 prohibits an individual from possessing firearms if they are convicted of the misdemeanor crime of unlawful aiming or discharge of a firearm. This poorly conceived legislation even applies to airguns and slingshots and has no exception for an individual aiming or discharging a firearm for self-defense purposes in a location that would have otherwise not been authorized.
The following bills received a floor vote and passed out of their respective chambers:
Senate Bill 5434 passed by a 27-20 vote. It increases prohibited areas where law-abiding citizens cannot possess firearms, including CPL holders carrying for self-defense. The bill extended “gun-free zones” to public parks, libraries, and child care centers before being amended to only apply to child care centers. In addition to leaving law-abiding citizens defenseless against criminals who ignore arbitrary boundaries, the bill requires child care centers to publicly indicate they are “gun-free zones” by posting signs outside the facilities.
House Bill 2622 passed by a 56-42 vote. It modifies Washington’s existing firearm surrender provisions for individuals subject to a court order. This bill compels a respondent to appear and provide proof on how and to what extent they complied with the surrender order. This is a serious encroachment on the right against compelled self-incrimination in any criminal, civil, or other government proceedings. Failure to appear results in the individual being in contempt of court, thereby putting the individual in a no-win situation.
House Bill 2305 passed by a 55-42 vote. It imposes a mandatory firearm prohibition for respondents of a Vulnerable Adult Protective Order. This order, which removes someone’s Second Amendment rights for up to 5 years, requires no criminal convictions or even charges. Due process limits restrictions on constitutional rights to only serious convictions and adjudications that provide procedural protections to the accused, which results in more reliable proceedings. The Right to Keep and Bear Arms should not be treated as a second-class right and should only be restricted when sufficient protections are in place.
Additionally, the House voted to pass House Bill 2467 by a vote of 66-32. HB 2467 directs Washington State Patrol to create a centralized state system for all firearm transfers to allow firearm dealers to submit information electronically and receive feedback instantaneously. This bill was introduced by a bipartisan group of legislators who have recognized that background checks in Washington have imposed excessive delays on gun owners. Background checks for handgun transfers are done in an archaic manner by mail to local law enforcement, who are tasked with manually checking databases. CPL holders previously were able to avoid the archaic check for handguns and instead were allowed to go through the federal NICS as a courtesy, which provided instant feedback. That exemption ceased in July, 2019. The enactment of I-1639 also added transfers of semi-automatic rifles to this system, with the addition of an $18 fee. Though this archaic background check has a ten day waiting period to allow for completion, these factors, along with I-594 requiring background checks on all transfers, has resulted in ever increasing strain on this system, creating delays that drag out up to 30 days. Unfortunately, there will be a fee attached to the background check, which has been capped at $18 per transaction.
Billionaire media mogul Michael Bloomberg’s presidential run helped gun-rights groups light a fire under owners of firearms who grew somewhat complacent in the era of President Trump.
Gun groups ranging from the National Rifle Association to Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership are whipping up their members with dire warnings about a potential President Bloomberg.
A former mayor of New York City who leapfrogged to the top-tier in the Democratic presidential race, Mr. Bloomberg has a long record of challenging the Second Amendment from his get-tough policies as mayor to bankrolling a massive gun control advocacy organization.
The National Association for Gun Rights alerted its members on social media to Mr. Bloomberg’s $300 million campaign to “DESTROY the Second Amendment,” calling on them to unite and stop “his anti-gun agenda.”
“Our members are motivated by Mike Bloomberg and have been for a while,” said Dudley Brown, president of the National Association for Gun Rights. “He is a billionaire and one of his main focuses has been spending his own personal money to destroy the Second Amendment. And he has been relatively successful. All of the groups on the left rely on his money.”
Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam’s sweeping gun, magazine, and suppressor ban was defeated in the state senate’s Judiciary Committee Monday morning in front of a crowd of gun owners and Second Amendment supporters. Four Democrats joined every Republican on the committee in rejecting HB961, which had narrowly advanced out of the House of Delegates just before a legislative deadline last week.
Committee chairman John Edwards joined fellow Democrats Chap Petersen, Creigh Deeds, Scott Surovell, and every Republican on the committee to send the bill to the Virginia Crime Commission for further study, which kills the bill’s chances for this legislative session.
The gun ban bill was the first on the docket for the Judiciary Committee, and GOP members grilled bill sponsor Del. Mark Levine over his definition of an “assault weapon,” the arbitrary ban on ammunition magazines that can hold more than twelve rounds, and other aspects of the legislation.
“This weapons restriction is clearly constitutional,” claimed Levine, noting that in a challenge to a similar ban in Maryland, the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals declared that so-called assault weapons are not protected by the Second Amendment. What Levine didn’t say is that the U.S. Supreme Court hasn’t taken up a case dealing with semi-automatic long guns.
Gov. Northam’s director of public safety, Brian Moran, also claimed the bill would pass constitutional muster by citing the Kolbe case as well, calling the guns that would be banned under HB961 “weapons of war.” According to the National Shooting Sports Foundation, the guns that would have been banned under the bill are the most commonly manufactured rifles in the United States today, and the U.S. Supreme Court has said that arms that are in common use for lawful purposes are protected by the Second Amendment.
Levine also claimed that HB961 didn’t “infringe on anyone’s rights,” though it absolutely would have infringed on the rights of those Virginians who would seek to purchase one of these firearms, magazines, or suppressors after the ban went into effect. Additionally, any owner of a magazine defined as “high capacity” would have been guilty of a misdemeanor if they continued to possess the magazines they currently own.
While the gun, magazine, and suppressor bill is dead for this legislative session, it will almost surely be back again next year, and in the meantime Gov. Northam will likely get a chance to sign several gun control bills, including measures that would roll back the state’s firearm preemption law, change training requirements for concealed carry licensees, and more.
On Jan. 20, as Americans remembered civil rights hero Martin Luther King Jr., an estimated 10,000 people peacefully rallied in Richmond, Virginia, to protest the recent introduction of highly contentious gun control bills into the state Legislature.
Motivated in part by the “Second Amendment Sanctuary” movement that has seen more than 100 Virginia counties and cities pass measures denouncing—and in some cases, preemptively refusing to enforce—constitutionally suspect gun laws, some Virginians at the rally began chants of “We will not comply.”
Many gun control advocates have denounced these chants (and the Second Amendment Sanctuary movement itself) as undemocratic and anti-American. While this reaction was predictable, voicing a collective refusal to comply with laws perceived as unconstitutional or unjust is a fundamental part of American democratic discourse.
In fact, the mantra “We will not comply” helped set the stage for America as it exists today.
In 1765, the British Parliament passed the Stamp Act, which imposed a tax on nearly every piece of paper used by the American colonists. The colonists considered this a direct tax on them without the approval of the colonial legislatures—a flagrant violation of longstanding legal precedent and an affront to their rights as Englishmen.
Threats of noncompliance and public protests so troubled Parliament that the act was repealed before ever being put into effect.
Thus began nearly two decades of actual and threatened colonial noncompliance with British laws that increasingly threatened the rights and liberties of the colonists. This included widespread noncompliance with laws that severely curtailed the ability of colonists to keep and bear arms.
Americans routinely circumvented or ignored bans on the importation of firearms and powder, and eventually resorted to armed defensive action against British attempts to confiscate guns and powder stores from colonial communities.
Noncompliance with federal laws mandating the return of escaped slaves was rampant throughout northern states prior to the Civil War. In 1850, the Vermont Legislature went so far as to pass a law effectively requiring state judicial and law enforcement officers to act in direct opposition to the federal Fugitive Slave Law.
Even in jurisdictions that did not act officially act to condone noncompliance, individual noncompliance with federal slave laws was nonetheless widespread. Moreover, a generally lax approach to local enforcement in the North raised the ire of Southern states, where calls abounded for the federal government to send in military units to ensure adequate enforcement.
Importantly, many abolitionists refused to keep their intentions quiet—they, too, were vocal about their refusal to comply with laws they considered both unconstitutional and morally unjust.
“We will not comply” was very much a general refrain of the now-beloved abolitionist movement.
Noncompliance permeated democratic discourse throughout the 20th century, as well. Some of the most revered figures of the civil rights era were actually brought to the national spotlight by acts of noncompliance.
Rosa Parks refused to comply with a city ordinance mandating segregated buses that would force her to the back of the bus. Hundreds refused to comply with state laws by engaging in sit-ins. King spent periods in jail for his repeated refusals to comply with court orders.
Of course, America’s history with noncompliance and civil disobedience has also been complicated. Not all acts of noncompliance are later held to be meritorious. Many times, one side’s appeal to a higher law is another side’s accusation that the rule of law has been betrayed.
Noncompliance with school integration orders resulted in sometimes-violent standoffs among local, state, and federal agencies, and history has not treated these acts of noncompliance kindly.
Noncompliance with alcohol laws during the Prohibition era helped foster the rise of gangster violence (though, interestingly enough, widespread noncompliance was one of the major underlying factors leading to Prohibition’s eventual repeal).
During the Vietnam War, an estimated tens of thousands of young draft-eligible men faced severe criticism and legal consequences for refusing to comply with what they perceived to be an unjust draft system that would send them to fight in an unjust war.
But the fact that history judges some acts of noncompliance more harshly than others does not negate the reality of history itself. It merely reminds us that threats of noncompliance should not be undertaken lightly. They should be based on well-reasoned and principled appeals that will withstand the judgment of our descendants.
Threatening noncompliance is not unique to modern gun owners, nor unique to modern American discourse.
“We will not comply” is neither an undemocratic threat nor an un-American resolve.
It is a long-standing part of democratic discourse, and an utterly American promise to strive for compliance with a higher law.
PHOENIX (AP) — An Arizona Senate panel on Thursday advanced a measure that would make government entities that don’t allow guns on their property liable if people are shot on their premises.
The proposal from Republican Sen. David Gowan would allow anyone to sue if they or loved ones are injured or killed after being barred from carrying weapons for self-defense on government property.
The measure is the latest in a years-long series of pro-gun measures that are routinely approved by the Republican-controlled Legislature.
Arizona is among the most gun-friendly states in the nation, allowing open or concealed carry of guns without a permit in most places. But efforts to allow weapons on property owned by schools, universities and government buildings have failed.
“It’s just a simple bill that says if a government creates gun-free zones which prohibit a law-abiding citizen from defending themselves, then if harm comes to them because of that policy that entity will be held liable for the damages,” Gowan told the Senate Judiciary Committee. “The point is, if you have a policy like this you protect them or allow them to protect themselves or there will be consequences.”
Missouri Senate bills seek to strengthen gun rights A bill that would allow concealed carry permit holders to bring guns onto college campuses and other places drew opposition from public safety officials from Lincoln University and the University of Central Missouri in a hearing Thursday.
A bill that would allow concealed carry permit holders to bring guns onto college campuses and other places drew opposition from public safety officials from Lincoln University and the University of Central Missouri in a hearing Thursday.
The Senate Transportation and Public Safety Committee heard two bills Thursday morning that are intended to strengthen gun rights, both sponsored by Sen. Eric Burlison, R-Battlefield.
One was “anti-commandeering legislation” that bars any law enforcement officer in Missouri from enforcing federal gun laws that infringe on Second Amendment rights.
The other allows people with concealed carry permits to bring guns and other deadly weapons onto college campuses and other places they’re currently restricted. Allowing concealed carry on campus was the most controversial part of that bill, with leaders of campus police of two universities testifying against it.
Americans are not happy with the prospect of a socialist candidate like Bernie Sanders for president, a new poll finds.
A majority of US residents — 53 percent — said they would vote against a socialist candidate for president, the Gallup poll released Tuesday reveals. Meanwhile, only 45 percent of respondents in the poll said they would vote for a socialist.
In fact, socialism was the only category in the poll rejected by a majority of Americans.
For example, 60 percent of Americans said they would vote for an atheist while 38 percent said they wouldn’t. And more than nine in 10 Americans said they would vote for a presidential candidate nominated by their party who is black, Catholic, Hispanic, Jewish or a woman.
The findings come as Sanders (I-Vt.) — a self-described Democratic socialist — is a top-tier candidate vying to win the Democratic nomination for president. He was leading in polls to win Tuesday’s New Hampshire primary and has surged ahead of Joe Biden in national polls.
There is a political divide over the socialist candidate question, however.
For example, 82 percent of Republicans said they wouldn’t vote for a socialist while just 17 percent said they would. By comparison, 76 percent of Democrats said they would vote for a socialist, while 21 percent wouldn’t.
Significantly, only 45 percent of key swing-state voters — self-described independents — would vote for a socialist while 51 percent said they would not.
Mr French is being sarcastic as he’s one of the big Never-Trumpers
“So my problem with David French’s claim that Christians shouldn’t vote for Trump is that if you take it seriously, Christians shouldn’t vote for anyone because no president in my lifetime was Christ-like enough to meet French’s standard. (No, not even Jimmy Carter, whose public piety is merely cover for a poisonous personality). Now if you want to argue for monastic exclusion from politics, that’s fine (though to my mind stupid). But if you want to argue for it only when Trump is president, then I question your sincerity, and French’s rather pharasaical tone doesn’t help.
But despite his argument, I think even a serious pro-life Christian might conclude that, given a choice between an un-Christ-like politician who is loudly and vigorously in favor of abortion (i.e. any Democrat these days), and an un-Christ-like politician who is without doubt the most pro-life president we’ve ever had, it’s okay to support the latter. French attempts to engage this argument but to my mind he is not successful. I doubt many will find the piece all that persuasive but I think that French’s main intended audience was David French, whose faith in neverTrumpism may need bolstering at this point. And I’m not sure it’s impossible to love your enemies while still trying to kick their ass.
On a broader note, so long as we’re talking about sin, I’ll note that pride and envy seem to play a major role in the NeverTrump movement in general: Pride in (self-proclaimed) moral superiority, and envy of Trump’s accomplishments, which make him by any reasonable measure the most conservative president of my lifetime. I’d suggest some self-reflection on this point'”–Dr Glenn Reynolds
Hate has no place in pro-life America. None. And embracing or defending hate—even hatred of the movement’s most vigorous opponents—for the sake of life contradicts the spirit of the movement and stands to do more harm than good to the political cause that so many Christians value the most.
American Evangelicals represent one of the most powerful religious movements in the world. They exercise veto power over the political success of any presidential candidate from one of America’s two great parties. Yet they don’t wield that power to veto the selection of a man who completely rejects—and even scorns—many of their core moral values.
I fully recognize what I’m saying. I fully recognize that refusing to hire a hater and refusing to hire a liar carries costs. If we see politics through worldly eyes, it makes no sense at all. Why would you adopt moral standards that put you at a disadvantage in an existential political struggle? If we don’t stand by Trump we will lose, and losing is unacceptable.
PRESCOTT, Ariz. – Two more rural Arizona counties have declared themselves to be “Second Amendment sanctuary counties,” taking stances in favor of gun rights even as some supporters of the measures acknowledge they’ll have no or little real legal effect.
The Yavapai County board approved its resolution after previously hearing hours of testimony in December and January. About 120 people packed the meeting room and dozens more filled the lobby Wednesday as 25 people spoke in favor and three against, The Daily Courier reported.
Under the measures, the supervisors vowed to defend state and federal constitutional rights, including the U.S. Constitution’s Second Amendment.
The measure also said the supervisors won’t spend public money or use other government resources to enforce laws that unconstitutionally infringe on gun rights.
Many of those who addressed the Yavapai County board urged the supervisors to take a stand, arguing that laws in other states infringed on gun owners’ rights.
“We see this type of total disregard for our Second Amendment rights under attack. This is about our rights, protecting our freedoms and liberty,” Prescott resident Sherrie Hanna said.
Virginia’s Unconstitutional Attack on Gun Owners Simply because a small number of psychopaths happen to like the aesthetics of a popular gun doesn’t magically transform that firearm something distinctively menacing to American society.
And not just the U.S., but also the Virginia Constitution
Today Virginia Democrats continue their multi-front offensive against the Second Amendment, taking up Governor Ralph Northam’s “assault weapons” ban, magazine limits, and suppressor-confiscation bills in the state house’s Public Safety Committee. That makes it as good time as any to remind people again that “assault weapons” bans are unconstitutional. The quicker an “assault weapon” ban case can be put in front of the Supreme Court — which, granted, has been reluctant to take on new gun cases — the better.
District of Columbia v. Heller found that the Second Amendment protected weapons “in common use by law-abiding citizens.” AR-15-style weapons, the most popular rifle in America, with over a million sold every year, clearly meet this criterion. Everything about the gun, from its mechanisms to its purpose, is common. Notwithstanding the rhetoric you hear from Virginia lawmakers, some appellate-court judges, and gun-control lobby mouthpieces, the AR-15 is not, nor has it ever been, a “weapon of war.” To say so is historically and functionally incorrect. Eugene Stoner, chief engineer of ArmaLite and its parent company, Colt, designed and marketed the AR specifically for civilians in the early 1960s, years before any military version was adopted. The AR-15 is less a “weapon of war” than a 1911 handgun, which the U.S. military adopted from that year to 1986.
Not that we should have any problems with weapons of war being in civilian hands per se. Muskets and flintlock rifles, the predominant guns of the revolutionary era, were also weapons of war. The Founders wanted civilians to own lethal weapons. Sorry, John Kerry, but the Second Amendment isn’t about hunting or recreation, or even predominately about personal home protection. So, yes, ARs are indeed dangerous. That’s the point. But the concerted effort to depict ARs as especially “dangerous and unusual” is only meant to place them outside the protections of Heller.
Indeed, there is no evidence that AR-15s pose a unique threat. Simply because a small number of psychopaths happen to like the aesthetics of a popular gun doesn’t magically transform that firearm something distinctively menacing to American society. Even if one conceded for the sake of argument that the presence of criminality was a sound rationale for restricting constitutional rights — an increasingly popular argument for ignoring the First Amendment, as well — the argument to ban AR-15s would become weaker.
Gun crimes fell precipitously, hitting historic lows, after the federal assault-weapon ban instituted in 1994 expired. In 2018, the last year of FBI data, there were 6,603 Americans murdered by handguns, 297 by rifles (most of them not AR-15s), and 236 by shotguns. (Gun types used in crimes aren’t reported by all police departments, but the trend is almost surely the same.) To put it in perspective, there were 1,604 knife homicides during that same span, and 656 people killed by fists and kicking. ARs are rarely used in crimes.
More important, if the state can ban one type of semi-automatic weapon simply because it looks a certain way or because one type of criminal favors it, what principle would constrain it from banning every semi-automatic weapon? The worst mass shooter in Virginia history did not use an AR but .22-caliber and 9mm handguns. If Northam can ban ARs, what stops him from banning a 9mm? Surely the cheering crowd at a CNN “townhall,” or the average Democratic presidential candidate, would answer, nothing.
Virginia lawmakers are also debating legislation that would make it a felony to possess a magazine that holds more than twelve rounds after January 1st, 2021, which, as Cam Edwards points out, would turn most Virginia gun owners into felons. Another bill would make it illegal to own a silencer. Right now, Americans own over a million silencers for all kinds of reasons — to avoid damaging their hearing or bothering their neighbors — but almost none of them own a silencer for criminal reasons. The ATF reports that there are around 44 silencer-related crimes per year over the past decade — or as Stephen Gutowski noted, something like .003 percent of silencers are used in crimes each year.
For now, most of the bills seem likely to fail. A more draconian state-senate bill that would have authorized the confiscation of assault-style weapons was already discarded. “This is a compromise that takes into account folks’ concerns and is still a good bill that will help reduce mass murders in the commonwealth,” Delegate Mark Levine, the Democrat sponsoring the legislation, told the Associated Press. There’s no evidence that any of these initiatives would make Virginians any safer, nor, as a matter of principle, is preemptively banning Americans from owning a firearm objectively different from confiscating the one they already own. Both are means to stop citizens from owning the gun. Both should be discarded as unconstitutional.
Is Trump’s Unorthodoxy Becoming Orthodox? The U.S. has become no better friend to an increasing number of allies and neutrals, and no worse an adversary to a shrinking group of enemies.
When candidate Donald Trump campaigned on calling China to account for its trade piracy, observers thought he was either crazy or dangerous.
Conventional Washington wisdom had assumed that an ascendant Beijing was almost preordained to world hegemony. Trump’s tariffs and polarization of China were considered about the worst thing an American president could do.
The accepted bipartisan strategy was to accommodate, not oppose, China’s growing power. The hope was that its newfound wealth and global influence would liberalize the ruling Communist government.
Four years later, only a naif believes that. Instead, there is an emerging consensus that China’s cutthroat violations of international norms were long ago overdue for an accounting.
China’s re-education camps, its Orwellian internal surveillance, its crackdown on Hong Kong democracy activists, and its secrecy about the deadly coronavirus outbreak have all convinced the world that China has now become a dangerous international outlier
Trump courted moderate Arab nations in forming an anti-Iranian coalition opposed to Iran’s terrorist and nuclear agendas. His policies utterly reversed the Obama administration’s estrangement from Israel and outreach to Tehran.
Last week, Trump nonchalantly offered the Palestinians a take-it-or-leave-it independent state on the West Bank, but without believing that a West Bank settlement was the key to peace in the entire Middle East.
In short, Trump’s Middle East recalibrations won few supporters among the bipartisan establishment.
But recently, Europeans have privately started to agree that more sanctions are needed on Iran, that the world is better off with Soleimani gone, and that the West Bank is not central to regional peace.
Iran has now become a pariah. U.S.-sponsored sanctions have reduced the theocracy to near-bankruptcy. Most nations understand that if Iran kills Americans or openly starts up its nuclear program, the U.S. will inflict disproportional damage on its infrastructure — a warning that at first baffled, then angered, and now has humiliated Iran.
In other words, there is now an entirely new Middle East orthodoxy that was unimaginable just three years ago.
Suddenly the pro-Iranian, anti-Western Palestinians have few supporters. Israel and a number of prominent Arab nations are unspoken allies of convenience against Iran. And Iran itself is seemingly weaker than at any other time in the theocracy’s history.
Stranger still, instead of demanding that the U.S. leave the region, many Middle Eastern nations privately seem eager for more of a now-reluctant U.S. presence.
For the last 20 years, much of the American orthodoxy had agreed with Europe that the increasingly anti-democratic, pan-continental, and borderless European Union was the remedy to all of Europe’s past 20th-century catastrophes.
As a result, American presidents did not do much when EU nations typically racked up large trade surpluses with the U.S., often a result of asymmetrical fees, tariffs, and fines.
The U.S. largely ignored the increasingly anti-democratic and anti-American tone of the EU.
Nor did Americans object much when lackadaisical European NATO nations habitually welched on their defense-spending commitments.
But then Trump again blew up more old assumptions.
NATO will now only survive if its members keep their word and meet their spending promises. An economically stagnant, oil-hungry, and top-heavy EU will have to make radical changes, or it will sink into irrelevance and eventually break apart.
Trump got little credit for these revolutionary changes because he is, after all, Trump — a wheeler-dealer, an ostentatious outsider, unpredictable in action, and not shy about rude talk.
But his paradoxical and successful policies — the product of conservative, anti-war, and pro-worker agendas — are gradually winning supporters and uniting disparate groups.
After all, the U.S. is beefing up its military but using it only sparingly. It hits back hard at enemies but does not hit first. For Trump, being conventional is dangerous; being unpredictable is far safer.
For all Trump’s tough talk, his ace in the hole is American soft power — based on a globally dominant economy, its global lead in the production of gas and oil, and an omnipresent cultural juggernaut.
The result of the new orthodoxy is that the U.S. has become no better friend to an increasing number of allies and neutrals, and no worse an adversary to a shrinking group of enemies. And yet Trump’s paradox is that America’s successful new foreign policy is as praised privately as it is caricatured publicly — at least for now.
