Evidently, the NRA is unhappy with Vice President Joe Biden’s task force, emphasis mine:
“The National Rifle Association of America is made up of over 4 million moms and dads, daughters and sons, who are involved in the national conversation about how to prevent a tragedy like Newtown from ever happening again. We attended today’s White House meeting to discuss how to keep our children safe and were prepared to have a meaningful conversation about school safety, mental health issues, the marketing of violence to our kids and the collapse of federal prosecutions of violent criminals.
We were disappointed with how little this meeting had to do with keeping our children safe and how much it had to do with an agenda to attack the Second Amendment. While claiming that no policy proposals would be “prejudged,” this Task Force spent most of its time on proposed restrictions on lawful firearms owners – honest, taxpaying, hardworking Americans. It is unfortunate that this Administration continues to insist on pushing failed solutions to our nation’s most pressing problems. We will not allow law-abiding gun owners to be blamed for the acts of criminals and madmen. Instead, we will now take our commitment and meaningful contributions to members of congress of both parties who are interested in having an honest conversation about what works – and what does not.”
Note the only slightly veiled threat to fight efforts at gun control with bribes to Congress. As if they haven’t been doing this all along.
On Fox News Sunday Chris Wallace asked conservative Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia if he interprets the Second Amendment as allowing for any limitations on the right to keep and bear arms. Think Progress:
Scalia admitted there could be, such as “frighting” (carrying a big ax just to scare people), but they would still have to be determined with an 18th-Century perspective in mind.
Wallace then asked Scalia “What about… a weapon that can fire a hundred shots in a minute?”, resulting in the following response from Scalia (which basically amounts to Scalia suggesting that such weapons as rocket launchers would be allowed according to his very literal interpretation of the Constitution.):
“We’ll see. Obviously the Amendment does not apply to arms that cannot be hand-carried — it’s to keep and “bear,” so it doesn’t apply to cannons — but I suppose here are hand-held rocket launchers that can bring down airplanes, that will have to be decided.”
You’ve probably either seen the news clips on television, or read something about Congress’ vote to hold U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder in contempt for supposedly withholding information in the investigation of “Fast and Furious”. And, if you have, there is a very good possibility that you’re confused considering how ridiculous and outrageous this whole mess is.
Not to worry, Rachel Maddow to the rescue, during 2 segments of her show. Watch this video/segment first in order to learn the basis of the latest wingnut conspiracy theory which got Holder in trouble with the congressional Frothing-at-the-Mouth-Republicans:
The second video talks about the congressional action on Holder yesterday, along with some discussion of the gun control issue. Watch:
Now, Holder’s contempt citation isn’t the end of it by any means, and in fact, the President asserted executive authority in this matter yesterday, and while conservatives would like you believe that this means he was somehow directly involved in the idiocy, it does not necessarily mean that. Steve Benen:
A spokesperson for House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) said the decision "implies" that White House officials were involved in the operation. Fox News' Andrew Napolitano made the same argument on the air: "Executive privilege protects communications with the president, the human being of the president, not with people that work for him and the Justice Department."
No matter what one thinks of the underlying controversy -- and for the record, I think the right's interest in the matter is kind of silly -- it's worth pausing to clarify that executive privilege doesn't necessarily involve communications with the president. Josh Israel noted there are actually "two types executive privilege: the robust 'presidential communications privilege' and the more limited 'deliberative process privilege.'"
The White House may invoke the latter to apply to executive branch officials outside of the president's inner circle, as long as they were involved with the government's decision-making process. Presidents Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush, and George W. Bush all asserted executive privilege in matters not involving presidential communications.
And Bush Administration Attorney General Michael Mukasey invoked the same "deliberative process privilege" as recently as 2008, rejecting congressional subpoenas for reports of Department of Justice interviews with the White House staff regarding the Valerie Plame Wilson identify leak investigation.
Republicans, including House Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), are well aware of this -- they endorsed the distinction during the Bush/Cheney era -- and have acknowledged that executive privilege is not limited to the president's direct communications.
But they're playing a political game today, hoping you aren't well aware of this.
Now that you’re reasonably well informed you might be tempted to think that since this mess all hinges on both a George W. Bush policy, and a seriously crazy/whacko conspiracy theory by a ridiculous little man wingnut who counts for, well, nothing, that this will all go away soon.
You would be wrong. The contempt vote against Holder is just a step on the way to holding the president in contempt, then going for impeachment proceedings in his second term. They were always gonna do this. They made plans to “lynch them a Negro” ™ back when President Obama was elected or maybe even during the run-up to the election. After all, there was no way the good old boys with power were ever going to be alright with a black man as the president. If you thought otherwise, you were, like myself, deluded.
And, just as it will be a modern form of lynching, so too will it be a modern coup d’etat.
Last weekend in Reno, Nevada, former half-term governor, Sarah Palin, addressed the Safari Club International’s annual convention. Notably, she warned the audience that President Obama wants to take their guns. Yee haw!
This recent talk coming from the White House about President Obama's attempts to perhaps infringe further upon our Second Amendment rights. We need to keep tabs on what the White House is telling us. Just think if we had even stricter gun control laws! Imagine, though—imagine making life even more miserable for the liberals who want that gun control. Here's how I figure it. Remember that weird guy in Wisconsin was so angry, so upset, watching a Palin win slot after slot each week on Dancing with the Stars that he shot Bristol through his TV? He blasted his Panasonic? Well, I'm thinking, 'Imagine more gun control. Then he'd have to attack his Panasonic with a butter knife.'
Meanwhile, yesterday, Mayor Bloomberg’s probe announced their findings that guns are easily purchased illegally in Arizona.
On Monday, Bloomberg trumpeted the findings as proof that current gun-control regulations are ineffective at keeping firearms out of the hands of criminals, the mentally ill and others who are barred by law from purchasing them.
Private gun merchants are not required to run background checks when they sell firearms, but are barred from providing them to individuals who the seller "has reason to believe" are prohibited from purchasing weapons. In one video, however, a seller at the gun show tells the investigator, "Just need to see an Arizona ID and that's it with me." When the investigator replied that he "probably couldn't pass one," the seller looks down, shakes his head and proceeds with the sale.
The investigators also purchased a Glock 9mm -- similar to the gun alleged Tucson shooter Jared Loughner used -- without a background check from a private seller at the gun show, which is legal under a loophole in federal firearms laws. Although federally-licensed gun-dealers are required to make background checks before selling guns, private and supposedly "occasional" dealers are not required to conduct such checks.
Critics of the current sales law say the gun-show loophole allows criminals and other prohibited buyers an easy avenue for purchasing guns, but legislation to change that has stalled in Congress. After the Tucson shooting earlier this month, several lawmakers introduced bills to strengthen gun laws, including a bill that would require background checks for all gun sales, but they are unlikely to pass.
The constant lies from the Right Wing just make me freaking tired.
Sharron Angle alluding to armed insurrection during an interview in January with right wing radio show host, Lars Larson in Portland, Oregon. Larson asked her where she stands on Second Amendment issues, and this was Angle’s response:
You know, our Founding Fathers, they put that Second Amendment in there for a good reason and that was for the people to protect themselves against a tyrannical government. And in fact Thomas Jefferson said it's good for a country to have a revolution every 20 years.
I hope that's not where we're going, but you know if this Congress keeps going the way it is, people are really looking toward those Second Amendment remedies and saying my goodness what can we do to turn this country around? I'll tell you the first thing we need to do is take Harry Reid out
She’s your typical Republican these days. A few years ago, she would have been considered very fringe. She sounds like a hick, and she sounds like she’s putting out a hit on Harry Reid.
Oh goody. Now people can have shootouts in church. At least in Louisiana. Via Jason Linkins:
Governor Bobby Jindal has recently signed into law a measure that would allow you to at least feel comforted by the presence of your gun in the house of the Lord. From the New Orleans Times-Picayune:
Gov. Bobby Jindal has signed into law one of the more controversial bills from the recent legislative session, one allowing guns to be carried into houses of worship.
[State Representative Henry] Burns' [R-Haughton] bill would authorize persons who qualified to carry concealed weapons having passed the training and background checks to bring them to churches, mosques, synagogues or other houses of worship as part of a security force.
Do you ever feel like our civilization is regressing? Thanks, GOP.
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