The Obama administration did win some support from the appeals court for the individual mandate. One of the three judges, Stanley Marcus, dissented from the majority opinion.
The majority “has ignored the undeniable fact that Congress’ commerce power has grown exponentially over the past two centuries and is now generally accepted as having afforded Congress the authority to create rules regulating large areas of our national economy,” wrote Marcus, also a Clinton appointee to the appeals court.
Translation: since Congress has usurped the power of the states and of individuals so effectively in the past, there is now no reason not to let Congress just do anything it wants. Anything at all, it seems.
In my recent article at Renewing American Leadership, redefining the “seamless garment” argument for pro-life causes, I mentioned that supporting the personal right to own and carry suitable weapons for self-defense is itself a highly pro-life position.
It took about 90 minutes for the police to respond effectively. While that’s an atypically long time by US standards, the fact is that the police in the USA almost never “get there” in time to stop murders, even multiple murders. The only people who can stop them are those on the scene.
Those who congratulate themselves for being in favor of making it essentially impossible for private citizens to defend themselves and their loved ones, from some “morally superior” perspective that believes laws against guns save lives, are simply ignorant of the facts regarding gun ownership (including keep and bearing) by law abiding citizens, and have the blood of innocents on their hands wherever they’ve succeeded in imposing such restrictions.
A gun locked up in a safe in a closet does you very little good when you’re attacked in grocery store…. or on an island. 40 states have realized this, and now have “shall issue” laws for concealed carry permits, meaning that people without criminal backgrounds are automatically approved with suitable training. I wonder how long it will be before the rest of the states come around. I wonder how many people who could have defended themselves will have to die before those states change their laws. I also wonder how many people will be attacked who might not have been if the criminals had not been so certain that their intended victims were not armed.
“Gun free zone” equals “target rich environment” for lunatics and just plain killers, who ignore gun laws by definition.
The nation that refuses to allow people the means to defend themselves is also the nation that refuses to defend itself, it seems.
During the Los Angeles riots, many shopkeepers armed themselves and defended their property, often with great effect, in the sense that the rioters simply went to destroy and loot stores where the shopkeepers didn’t shoot at them. Reports widely circulated at the time repeatedly revealed police decisons NOT to defend property and people for fear of “escalation.” They literally abandoned the residents of many neighborhoods to their own devices.
One Korean businessman’s report:
Jong Min Kang, president of the Korean American Business Association, was president of Korean Young Adult Team of L.A., when the riots erupted.
“THERE was a lot of activity to protect Korean businesses, especially in Koreatown. A lot of young Korean people had weapons. There was every kind of weapon, AK-47s and Uzis.
“I have two businesses, one downtown, which is general wholesale merchandise, and another in South Central, a discount retail shop. My store in South Central is in a strip mall and there were more than 100 merchants there and more than 20 security guards to protect the Korean stores. So (the rioters) couldn’t come in. Nothing happened to those stores but a lot of other stores were burned. It was a terrible situation.”
Britain’s experience shows what happens when a disarmed populace is confronted with amoral looters and thugs. On the other hand, far from increasing the chaos, the presence of firearms is wonderfully clarifying. People who are determined to protect themselves, their loved ones and their property do not make good victims. Even ARMED thugs simply choose to go elsewhere (the LA riots experience), let alone cretins whose primary weapons are rocks and bats. The criminals are not brave. They are looking for easy victims at low risk to themselves.
Britain may be abdicating as a nation. I hope not. But the signs are all there of an aging society that can’t rouse itself to take necessary action to defend itself, a society that just seems not to care if it survives or not. On the other hand, there are many elements of current British society which, even if they are not directly behind the unrest (an open question, in my judgment), will surely be happy to take advantage of it to push their own agenda for Britain.
Thomas Friedman has really lost his mind. He seems to think that if both parties get together and agree to ignore the laws of economics in concert, then everything will be better.
Here is the youtube channel that explains in very simple, short videos, what the problem is with government spending, regulation, and general uncalled for interference in our lives, with equal time spent on nannystaters, regulators, and general busybodies.
It’s called “Mock The Spending,” obviously a takeoff on “Rock the vote.”
Here’s one of the videos, but there are many, and the whole channel is pretty entertaining.
This is an especially funny one called, “If the government patched World of Warcraft”:
British Prime Minister David Cameron recalled Parliament from its summer recess Tuesday and nearly tripled the number of police on the streets after three days of rioting in London blossomed into a full-blown political crisis.
Cameron described the scenes of burning buildings and smashed windows in London and several other British cities as “sickening,” but refrained from more extreme measures such as calling in the military to help beleaguered police restore order.
Instead, he said 16,000 officers would be on the streets of the capital Tuesday night, almost tripling the number that were out Monday night.
“People should be in no doubt that we will do everything necessary to restore order to Britain’s streets and to make them safe for the law-abiding,” Cameron told reporters after rushing home from an Italian vacation to chair a crisis meeting at his Downing Street office.
A wave of violence and looting has raged across London since Saturday, as authorities struggled to contain the country’s worst unrest since race riots set the capital ablaze in the 1980s.
Some 525 arrests have been made in London alone and dozens were arrested in other cities. Police announced Tuesday that plastic bullets would be “one of the tactics” available to officers to quell the riots.
The riots also claimed their first death — a 26-year-old found shot dead in a car.
Parliament will return to duty on Thursday, as the political fallout from the rampage takes hold. The crisis is a major test for Cameron’s Conservative-led coalition government, which includes Liberal Democrats who had long suspected its program of harsh budget restraints could provoke popular dissent.
Is this our future in the USA? Will the people who’ve been taught that society owes them a living rise up and demand their “rights”?
Tum da de tum, here is another entry in the Powerline Prize contest. This one didn’t win anything, but it has the singular distinction of having been a project of my family, with my son, “A. Shack,” composing the rap and performing the song, my wife (Mrs. Miner) performing some pseudo “baby voices,” with some music production and amateur video editing from me, Harmonicminer.
