By Douglas V. Gibbs
Author, Speaker, Instructor, Radio Host
Shootings scare people. Guns scare people. I get it. It’s like racism. If you don’t know much about something, it tends to scare you. The liberal left progressive socialist Democrats, or at least a large segment of them, don’t know enough about guns to understand the folly of their gun control position. The rest of them do understand guns, and the thought of a populace able to defend itself against their planned tyranny scares them.
Recent shootings have the Democrats up in arms … well, not arms, per se, but they are pretty upset. The problem is, so are the Republicans.
Most of your left-wing voters truly believe that more gun control laws would somehow stop the violence. It amazes me that they are convinced that penalizing legal gun owners would make an impact. First of all, it would be like taking away everyone’s driver’s licenses and vehicles because of drunk drivers. Alcoholics will still get drunk, and find a new way to cause problems. Second, while they respond with a “that’ll never happen here in America” sound bite, the reality is that when a populace is unarmed, the odds of the government becoming tyrannical shoots through the roof. Every brutal dictatorship in the last one hundred years disarmed the public before they changed from being an administration of the people to a ruthless murderous authoritarian oligarchy bent on killing millions who they believed may stand in the way of their power.
The Founding Fathers recognized the same trends in their own study of history. In fact, they knew first hand. Think about it. The British Empire kept becoming more and more difficult to deal with, laying down tyrannical laws and taxes to the point that the colonists, who had been simply protesting and voicing their dissatisfaction, up to that point, were finally willing to stand firm with their firearms over their shoulders. So, knowing that the way to stiffen their control over the American Colonists was to take away their ability to fight back, the British targeted their guns, marching towards Concord where the largest armory in the colonies existed. At that point, the Americans did not petition the king to be nice and not take their guns, and they didn’t simply protest, anymore. The Americans took up arms and met the British troops at Lexington, where, in order to stop the increase of tyranny, they shot at the British Troops.
One wonders, in our current political landscape, if the founders in our shoes would be shooting by now.
Knowing what they knew after dealing with the British, and studying history, when working on the U.S. Constitution during the convention in 1787, and the subsequent debates regarding the Bill of Rights, they designed the federal government (if We the People made sure we followed the Constitution) to not be a tyranny (or a socialist system), and for the people to have in their control mechanisms to stop tyranny should power hungry big government politicians infiltrate our federal government. First, through legislators in the House of Representatives the people were given the power of the purse-strings, which means that if they don’t like what is going on, through their representation they can starve the tyrants of money. Second, the federal government was not authorized to interfere with the tools the people need to stave off tyranny, such as the freedoms of religion, speech, press, assembly, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances (First Amendment). Third, should all of that fail, the right to keep and bear arms (the Second Amendment), which they saw as being “necessary to the security of a free state”, was made a part of the Bill of Rights. While an armed conflict was expected to be the last resort, the whole purpose of arming the public is to enable the citizens to “alter or abolish” their government should it become tyrannical.
The purpose of the Bill of Rights was not to tell the federal government to protect or guarantee our rights, but to tell it “hands off” our rights. That’s the reason for all of the “negative” language (Obama called the Constitution, in reference to the negative language in the Bill of Rights, a document of “negative liberties” … going on to complain that he didn’t like the Constitution because it tells the government “what it can’t do, rather than what it should do”).
The reason for all of the “Congress shall make no law,” “shall not be infringed,” and “shall not be violated” language in the Bill of Rights is because when it comes to domestic issues, for the most part, the federal government should do nothing at all.
Our rights are none of its business.
Which brings us back to the Republicans seeking red flag laws after the recent shootings.
If the Republican Party is supposed to be, out of the two parties, the political party closest to following the U.S. Constitution, why would they consider such an unconstitutional action?
Could it be that they don’t understand the Constitution? Do they feel so pressured by the liberal left that they are willing to stomp on the Constitution in order to appease their left-wing critics? Could it be that the Grand Ol’ Party has been infiltrated by liberal left progressive socialist commie bastards? Or … could it be all of the above?
That is why we need to be putting the First Amendment (Religion, Speech, Press, Assembly, and the right to petition the government for a redress of grievances) into practice right now. In other words, pray about it, talk about it, write in our blogs and to our newspapers and Congress critters about it, gather with like minded people about it in meetings and rallies, and be activists about it. Otherwise, the shootings may truly only be the beginning.
— Political Pistachio Conservative News and Commentary