Thursday, January 24, 2013

Mr. President, "The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed."

Seriously, Mr. President, what part of this do you not understand?

Why do I say this? Oh, I don't know, probably because the President and large quantities of American liberals, of both the Neighborhood and Activist variety, seem to think the 2nd Amendment says, "The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed, unless the President and Congress deem this less necessary because reasons."

Except it doesn't say that. It says "The right of the people to keep and bear arms SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED." (For those of you from Palm Beach County, FL, that would be the end of this Amendment. That other stuff above isn't in there.)

So perhaps it's time once again to give a Constitutional History lesson to our President, the Constitutional Law professor.

THUD. THUD. THUD. THUD. THUD. THUD. THUD. THUD. THUD. THUD. THUD. THUD. THUD.

(That was the sound of me banging my head against my desk in frustration that such an explanation is necessary.)

Some of you, including our President, have been laboring under the assumption that the Second Amendment was in place to ensure that Americans had the ability to protect their homesteads against wolves, or thieves, or for use in hunting, or some other such thing in the early days of our nation before widespread police protection.  It also wasn't just about the ability of the people to have a "Well-regulated Militia," which is now unnecessary because we have a standing military.

It wasn't.

Actually, if you look back on the founding of our nation, you will find that our nation was founded because the Founders overthrew a tyrannical government that was taking away our rights. While we hope the ballot box and a free press (however biased and clearly stilted to the side of liberalism) should make this need unnecessary, the moment a free people find themselves being oppressed by a tyrannical government, we have the God-given right to overthrow that government.  

(I am not advocating such a revolution at this time, by the way, I am simply teaching a history lesson on the reason for the Second Amendment.)

If history has shown us anything it is this: An armed government with an unarmed populace leads to tyranny. When the National Socialist Party (aka Nazi Party) took over Germany, one of the first things Adolf Hitler did was take away all guns (save for the Gestapo and the Military, of course). He wasn't the only one. Josef Stalin in the Soviet Union, Mao Tse Tung in Communist China, Pol Pot in Cambodia, Fidel Castro in Cuba, Saddam Hussein in Iraq...I can continue for pages...all removed guns from their citizens hands, while keeping them for themselves.

There was a reason why our Founding Fathers put the Right to Bear Arms in the Constitution. It wasn't to protect hunters rights and it wasn't just to protect citizens against invaders of their homes. It was to protect us from a tyrannical government. 

Any government that wants to limit that right makes me very scared. I'm especially scared when a President wants to do that, because unlike the Supreme Court and Congress, the Executive Branch's power is largely centered on one person.

To answer the question that is repeatedly asked, Why do we need "assault rifles" or "high capacity magazines?" Because the government has them. If we ever need to overthrow that government (and I am not suggesting we need to at this time) we need to be able to defend ourselves on equal footing.

So perhaps, Mr. President, former Constitutional Law professor, that might just be the reason the Founding Fathers said, and I again quote,

The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.


Period. End of discussion.

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