Parkland Commission Recomends Teacher Carry Guns

Tom Knighton at Bearing Arms notes that the Commission looking into the Parkland School Shooting made a recommendation that the school needed better law enforcement response and teachers need to be armed. The article can be found at Bearing Arms entitled Parkland Panel Blames Sheriff's Office, Argues Teachers Need Guns.

Anyone analyzing the threat to schools realizes that most schools are relatively soft targets with large numbers of relatively helpless children attending every weekday.  It is no wonder that schools attract those who want to make a statement by killing as many people as possible.  Making schools harder targets is only so helpful.  A fellow student can still get in because he belongs there.  And making the schools "gun free zones" (read target rich environments) doesn't make schools a less attractive target.  So, you still need some teachers who are willing to carry guns.

What Rep. Deutch is failing to note, what his party routinely fails to note, is that no one is demanding that all teachers be armed. Law enforcement isn’t demanding teachers carry guns, either. All anyone is saying is that it’s ridiculous that a teacher doesn’t have the option to be armed and they should have that choice.

You know, be pro-choice? I’m sure Mr. Deutch has heard that phrase before. Let’s call it a hunch.

While we all recognize that not every teacher will want to carry a gun, but there may be some. Carrying concealed is a burden, but surely some would not mind doing it for their students. Why not let those who do want to carry their guns to do so to schools? These would be concealed firearms, and unless someone blabs, there is no reason for any student to know who, if anyone might be carrying. This provides an additional security by complicating the calculation of those who would commit mass murder.  If we get rid of the "gun free zone" designation, parents who carry concealed and have business at the school could also carry, further complicating the would be mass murderers calculations.  I suspect that are much too self absorbed to care, frankly.

There are things we can do to harden the physical facility, but beyond that, we need to have armed security as well as concealed carry to make a those who would commit mass murder to think twice or more, and maybe think it might not be a good idea.

A Potentially Wide Ranging Supreme Court Case. Will The Supremes Do the Right Thing?

Tom Knighton, writing at Bearing Arms sends the post entitled SCOTUS Agrees To Hear Case That May Ultimately Undermine ATF Power. Well, yes it may undermine ATF power, which is good. If it goes far enough, and it really should, it may undermine the administrative state, as well as the power of the executive branch, bringing the power balance between the three branches closer in line with the Constitution.  

The real problem the Left has with Donald Trump is that he keeps appointing conservative judges and justices to the Federal courts. They still have leftist judges, of course, but if Trump is allowed to remain in office for eight long years, he may take the courts away from the Left. Since so much of their agenda is not really popular, they need the courts to put it into place. As an example, in a Democrat wave election, the people still voted to place Voter ID requirements into the North Carolina Constitution. Still, I expect that an attempt will be made to declare our new Constitutional Amendment somehow Unconstitutional through the Federal judiciary.  That is the current power of the Federal courts.

The Federal judges in turn have buttressed the administrative state through rulings such as the  Aure Deference and Chevron Deference that basically means that many regulations that are patently Unconstitutional are never looked at by the courts.  Striking down these deferences to the regulatory state may eventually dismantle the power to make laws and enforce those same laws.  It also will make it more difficult to change their minds on a whim, providing better assurances that the law is indeed the law.  As it stands, the law you rely on to form the basis of your actions may not be the law tomorrow, and indeed you may be charged with a crime that was not a crime when you took such action.*

Here's the dirty little secret: Presidential candidates rail against the administrative states power that is currently goring whatever portion of the constituency is crying loudest.  The EPA is always a target, of course.  The Department of Education has become a target because of Common Core.  In the gun world, the ATFE is often maligned.  But when in office, no President wants to give up any agency or power.

If the so called conservative Justices of the Supreme Court follow the Constitution, they will begin dismantling the administrative state.  All legislation, including rule making, belongs in the Congress.  The executive branch should only be enforcing the laws, rules and regulations that Congress makes.  If there is a difference of opinion, the Courts should be deciding it.   Let's see how successful Trump's judicial picks really are.

* As an example of such a law, I will site here New Jersey's new law that makes previously legal magazines contraband at Third Circuit: Second Amendment Is A Second Rate Right.  Though this Unconstitutional train wreck is a law created by actual legislators, it illustrates that in the current climate where the Constitution is no longer respected, such rulings become more and more likely.  Relying on deference, these Unconstitutional rulings will likely stand.  One of the things that has made our nation prosperous has been the idea that you can not be prosecuted for something done while that action was not illegal.

Are We a True Republic, or a Democracy In Name Only?

Kurt Schlichter says at Townhall.com in Viva La French Revolution 2,0, and Our Own what T, L. Davis says in his post at the Christian Mercenary entitled The Truth Remains, except Schlichter says it with more snark and humor. But the truth still does indeed remain.

Now, the protesting Parisians aren’t conservatives in the American sense – lots of their demands have a lefty vibe. But what they do share with us is how the abuse les deplorables have suffered mirrors the abuse America’s increasingly militant Normals have put up with. The French elite has kept dumping on them for decades, impoverishing them through economic mismanagement, cronyism, and corruption, changing their culture without bothering to ask permission through unlimited Third World immigration, and taxing them to increase elite wealth while stripping them of a say in their own government.

Sound familiar?

...snip...

So, what happens next? Bad stuff – and the dumber members of the elite will tell you their plans if you only listen. If you think our American elite is going to suddenly rediscover its obligation to work on behalf of Normals instead of using them as livestock, you haven’t been paying attention to just how arrogant and stupid our ruling class is. Look at their no-holds-barred quest to delegitimize and eliminate the challenge to their social grift posed by Donald Trump. But fortunately, he’s still there – no 67 senators are going to vote to impeach him because he paid off a couple of aging bimbos and, through some bizarre interpretation of “campaign finance laws” (which never seem to apply to the elite’s favorites), this is somehow THE WORST CRIME EVER TREASON EMOLUMENTS COLLUSION and MORE TREASON.

Oh, there are signs that the infamous Clinton Foundation may finally be investigated, and who knows, perhaps Hillary may be indicted. But this is all too little too late. Now that the Democrats have no use for her, they throw her to the wolves. But they allowed her to get away with all the felonious behavior as long as she served her purpose, and defended her all along the way.  The Democrats also let Eric Holder get away with Fast and Furious, because he still may be of use to them.  When he no longer is of use, perhaps he too will be finally investigated.  Then there is the whole Uranium One scandal.

These scandals and the felonies they entail will never be fully investigated, and the people who committed them will never be indicted much less receive jail time because powerful democrats don't have to follow the same laws everybody else  does.  And look, now they are making their felonies legal by through "ballot harvesting."  Soon, you will have no say in your own governance because the Leftists can always harvest enough ballots to overwhelm your vote.  Sorry illegal immigrants, the Left no longer has use for you either, now they have found another way.  Go home.

Please go to the links provided and read each article today.

Third Circuit Delivers Blow to NJ Gun Owners

Dean Weingarten has an interesting post over at Ammoland that looks at the dissent in the case of the Association of New Jersey Rifle and Pistol Clubs, Inc v. Attorney General of New Jersey which challenges the recent ban on magazines carrying more than 10 rounds of ammunition. Weingaten's article can be found at Third Circuit: Second Amendment is a Second Rate Right.

First, Weingarten sets the table:

The two majority judges followed the trend of other Circuits where the Second Amendment is being degraded and reduced to second-rate status. Only a month ago, the First Circuit ruled the Second Amendment does not apply outside of the home.

The rogue Circuits are able to do this because the Supreme Court has been refusing to hear Second Amendment cases for nearly a decade. The Supreme Court only hears a limited number of cases. They are not required to hear all cases.

Some Circuit courts are gutting the Second Amendment by claiming it is not really a right. Rather, they say, it is a privilege the government may regulate if the government thinks it might do some good to regulate it. These Jurists seem embarrassed by the Second Amendment. They seem to believe their job is to limit it as much as possible, rather than to protect it as a fundamental right.

Weingarten then cites the Dissenting opinion in the case of Judge Stephanos Bibas, and implies that this is a Judge we should be watching.

Yet the majority treats the Second Amendment differently in two ways. First, it weighs the merits of the case to pick a tier of scrutiny. That puts the cart before the horse. For all other rights, we pick a tier of scrutiny based only on whether the law impairs the core right. The Second Amendment’s core is the right to keep weapons for defending oneself and one’s family in one’s home. The majority agrees that this is the core. So whenever a law impairs that core right, we should apply strict scrutiny, period. That is the case here.

Second, though the majority purports to use intermediate scrutiny, it actually recreates the rational-basis test forbidden by Heller. It suggests that this record favors the government, but make no mistake—that is not what the District Court found. The majority repeatedly relies on evidence that the District Court did not rely on and expert testimony that the District Court said was “of little help.” 2018 WL 4688345, at *8. It effectively flips the burden of proof onto the challengers, treating both contested evidence and the lack of evidence as conclusively favoring the government.

We can only hope the Supreme Court hears this case, and finds for the New Jersey Association of Rifle and Pistol Clubs, Inc. According to an article by George Rasley at Conservative HQ, entitled Yes, They Are Coming For Your Guns:

Charles Toutant, writing for the New Jersey Law Journal, reports the appeals court, by a 2-1 margin, said the law limiting high-capacity magazines does not violate the Second Amendment, the Fifth Amendment’s Takings Clause or the Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause. The court affirmed an order from the U.S. District Court that denied the challengers’ motion to preliminarily enjoin enforcement of the law.

How many is Eric Swalwell willing to see killed?

Kurt Schlichter today asks Rep. Swalwell (Communist, California) How Much Blood Would Leftists Be Willing to Shed to Disarm Patriotic Americans? at Townhall.com. It is, as Schlichter notes, a fair question. At least one person has already been killed by police attempting to disarm one individual in Maryland under a Red Flag Law. So, Schlichter's question is not an idle one. We have proof of what these sorts of laws produce in the hands of gun grabbers.  We can also see the gun grabbing Left doesn't mind trampling all over our rights in order to achieve their goal of a docile and compliant population.

Schlichter:

Swalwell is the MSNBC stalwart who recently wrote an op-ed advocating that the government confiscate the guns that make people like him wet themselves and imprison those of us who decline to surrender them. Millions of Americans own these basic tools of freedom, which the ignorant call “assault weapons,” and these loyal citizens keep and bear them to protect themselves, their families, their communities and their Constitution. But Rep. Swalwell would make these citizens felons, though these patriots are only a threat to criminals and aspiring tyrants.

Of course, he wants to make these patriots felons because they are a threat to criminals and aspiring tyrants. After all, that’s what leftist Democrats like him are.

...snip...

So, in light of his party’s track record, I want to know how many people Rep. Swalwell – who fancies himself a potent Democrat presidential contender – is prepared to see die so he can ensure Americans are disarmed in order to please the liberal Californians he represents.

How many?

One?

One hundred?

One thousand?

One hundred thousand?

More?

I suspect we know the answer. Communist and their kissing cousins, Fascist governments killed an estimated 120 million of their own people in the last century. Is there any reason why Eric Swalwell might feel any more compassion for people standing in the way of his goals?

Georgi Boorman on Abortion

Interestingly, I find that a number of everyday people feel as I do that aborting your child is murder.  Period.  And if it is murder, then Yes, it would be just to punish women for aborting their babies according to Georgi Boorman at the Federalist. Of course, a number of women who abort their babies do find the act haunts them, and perhaps it is indeed all but the sociopaths who do. Still, if we recognize abortion as murder, then there must be a legal proceeding against it, or as I have often promoted, a legal proceeding to provide due process to the execution of an unborn child. To maintain otherwise is to maintain a cognitive dissonance for political expediency.

Ms. Boorman goes through all the reasons why otherwise pro-lifers back away from making the principled arguments.  Please go read the whole piece.  But let me leave you with this:

None of this makes any sense. While maintaining these inconsistencies may allow for moderate changes to the abortion regime, they will never succeed in outlawing abortion on a large scale or making it truly “culturally unacceptable.” Pro-lifers lose some of that zeal that comes from knowing the truth because they are constantly pouring effort into propping up failing arguments to appeal to moderates; yet the left keeps winning moderates by turning what should be well-presented, carefully considered, and logical arguments into scare tactics because no one is willing to think it through and articulate it to them.

You don’t have to ultimately agree with the practicality of, say, putting the death penalty on the table for abortion, to take the position seriously and respect its logical consistency. Yet mainstream pro-lifers are falling into the left’s hysteria trap by frantically trying to quash any mention of such propositions. We can’t seem to have an honest conversation even about prosecuting women, much less a death penalty, because we’re too busy trying to save face.

Backing prosecution for women who get abortions is the only tenable position to take. From there, the arguments are more practical. How long of a sentence is reasonable? How do mitigating circumstances factor in, such as coercion from a partner or family members? Are convicted aborters a danger to future children or society in general? How do we balance the cost of incarceration with the concept of justice? Are there other ways they can pay for their crimes?

Yet we can’t seem to move on to those important discussions, to introducing them carefully and thoughtfully to the public, because both the left and the mainstream pro-life movement are stuck on the fallacious idea that women should be exempted from all responsibility for their actions. MikFor the pro-life movement to succeed, they need to embrace their own core arguments’ conclusions.

Ballot Harvesting: The Newest Way to Steal an Election

I was initially puzzled when I read that Republican candidates in Kalifornia had been unseated by a process known as "ballot harvesting."  What on earth?  Apparently it caught a number of people by surprise because the methods used by ballot harvesters are just now coming out.  Scott Morefield has an article on the practice over at Townhall.com entitled 'Ballot Harvesting,' California Dems' Latest Election Stealing Tool. From the sound of it, no doubt Brenda Snipes wishes she could have had such a tool at her disposal in Broward County, Florida. Morefield talks about the various ways that Democrats can steal votes with this new system. To fully understand the quote, however, it helps if you first view an example of "ballot harvesting" being accomplished by a young woman calling herself Lulu:

Imagine the ramifications, or the ‘possibilities’ if you’re a Dem. What happens if, for example, Lulu’s next house visit has a “Make America Great Again” flag planted in the front yard? Could Lulu go there, pretend to be a Republican, then toss the completed ballot in the trash on the way to Ben & Jerry’s? Of course she could, and the likelihood of getting caught would be next to zero. Could she then go to someone’s home who had no intention of voting, then ‘convince’ them to vote Democrat and give their ballot to her or else their next social security check won’t be coming? Again, yes she could.

Or maybe a union boss asks the folks under his charge to become permanent “vote-by-mail” voters so, you know, he can keep them ‘informed’ on the issues. Or maybe a partisan nursing home administrator ‘helpfully’ collects the ballots of her residents only to shred those from all the guys wearing the Vietnam Veteran hats.

I could go on and on, but you get the point. It’s not that voting should be difficult, but at the same time it should be secret, transparent, and require a basic investment in time, becoming informed, and properly identifying oneself as an American citizen eligible for the right. The numerous ways California has sought to make the electoral process the ease-equivalent of an America’s Got Talent contest has opened the door to endless forms of fraud.

Please go read the entire article. Then go to the American Thinker, where you can also read a post by Monica Showalter entitled The Stomach Turning Ballot Harvesting That Enabled Democrats to Walk Off with California Note that this makes California a total one party state. Republicans need not even bother voting, unless they are willing to use the same tactics as Democrats.  Then it will become a race to see which party can deliver the most harvested ballots.  This is not democracy, this is straight anarchy.  Ballot harvesting takes away the one person has one vote idea (which they may exercise, or not.  Not exercising your vote is a vote nonetheless.)

You can expect the same practices to come to a State near you as soon as Democrats get control of a legislature in your State.  Even if they can't get control of a legislature, expect them to use the courts where possible to shift the balance their way, as they have used the courts to constantly tear down North Carolina's Voter ID laws.  Indeed, they attempted to sneak a Democrat on the ballot this time as a Republican in the Supreme Court race.  There seems to be no perfidy too low for these guys.