To hear some men talk of the government, you would suppose that Congress was the law of gravitation, and kept the planets in their places.
Wendell Phillips
[I was reminded of this one by BillH’s Hillary Is Delusional post.–Joe]
Category Archives: Politics
Who is Fascist?
I’ve written about this several times over the years, but it takes a true scholar to do a superior job of it. A while back, Jonah Goldberg did just that, and Thomas Sowell did a review on Goldgerg’s book:
Fascism, initially recognized as a kindred ideology of the left, has since come down to us defined as being on “the right” — indeed, as representing the farthest right, supposedly further extensions of conservatism.
The next time you hear Leftists throwing the word “Fascist” about like a general epithet, and then hanging it around the necks of capitalists or Jeffersonian liberals, you can correct their rather silly (and I have to think willfully ignorant) error.
Quote of the day–Richard Lamm
Christmas is the time when kids tell Santa what they want and adults pay for it. Deficits are when adults tell government what they want and their kids pay for it.
Richard Lamm
[This quote reminds me of a book I just finished listening to: The Coming Economic Collapse: How You Can Thrive When Oil Costs $200 a Barrel by Stephen Leeb and Glen Strathy. It has some interesting stuff in it. He claims we are headed for some very bad times, “Unless government does something.” Of course this annoys me a great deal unless he means that government should stop meddling in the free market. Published in 2006 he correctly predicted $100/barrel oil when it was $60 and the DOE was predicting it would return to the $35 to $45 range. He said gold would skyrocket. He is saying that we could even see the collapse of civilization because of the shortage of energy and our large debt.–Joe]
Quote of the day–Milton Friedman
If you put the federal government in charge of the Sahara Desert, in 5 years there’d be a shortage of sand.
Milton Friedman
The machine gun issue
Throughout the Heller case I think most hard core gun rights activists have been thinking “Will this help or hurt machine guns? Even if the Supreme Court slaps D.C. down on handguns, rifles, and shotguns will they create a rule or test that slams the door on machine guns becoming commonly available?”
I’ve been, behind the scenes, asking people not to even talk about machine guns in the context of Heller. My thought was that if machine guns are ignored in the Heller decision, then if we do things right after a Heller win we can get some machine gun relief eventually. Obviously it came up in a big way during the oral arguments. Some people have been critical of Gura for “throwing machine guns under the bus” during the oral arguments. I am not one of them. I viewed it as unfortunate collateral damage. We needed to bomb the crap out of D.C. and they were holding machine guns as hostages. It was more important to destroy D.C. now than to try and figure out a way to get the machine guns to safety. We might still be able to resurrect machine guns, they aren’t really dead, just on life support.
Now, via Uncle, I find Gura responds. I agree with him.
Working hard for dead last
We don’t have the best Brady score yet, but we are working on it.
Many, many thanks to Mike Brown at Idaho Sport Shooters Alliance who wrote this bill and pushed it through.
Contributions by everyone
The day before yesterday I wrote about others contributing to and being a part of history in the Heller case. Certainly the participants in that battle did some really heavy lifting and deserve credit for it. I’m also hearing some of them say encouraging words to the effect that they couldn’t have done it alone. That all the decades of activism on the part of the grass roots and enabled them attempt lopping off the head of the beast yesterday.
Listen to what Dave Kopel says.
Ashley Varner at NRA-ILA sent me this in an email after I told her to tend to important things and not to worry about answering my email right away:
I must kindly take issue with your last email. Don’t say you are unimportant — if I were to believe the Brady Campaign claims, we are all a part of the Triangle of Death and each of our different roles are important to the cause of pissing off anti-gunners, educating the mass of gun owners, inspiring others to join the fight and above all, preserving liberty for our future generations. 🙂
I have two “take aways” (Is that in common usage? Or is that just a Microsoft thing?) from this:
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The big hitters in our political game (a game of life and death!) are gracious.
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A contribution even at the very lowest levels make a difference so don’t think you can’t or don’t help by getting involved.
I MUST get a copy of this book
Jonah Goldberg’s Liberal Fascism is at the top of my must read list. Unfortunately the audio version isn’t out yet and I have a very large stack of paper books that I haven’t read beside my bed already.
My latest urge to get this book was fueled by Initial Thoughts… from Musings of The GeekWithA.45. Uncle and Kevin are also impressed with his post.
Last night while watching Farscape with son James I told him he must read the Geek’s post. It’s just wow!
Political actors?
I think there is a little bit of projection going on here:
Politics also factors heavily into D.C. v. Heller, according to Henigan.
He said some state attorneys general — who are elected in 43 states — likely sided with Heller as a way to show constituents they support an individual-rights reading of the Second Amendment, even as they seek to preserve their own state statutes regulating guns.
“These are political actors. They don’t want to appear to be endorsing a handgun ban,” Henigan said.
Quote of the day–Chairman Mao Ts-Tung
Our state is a people’s democratic dictatorship led by the working class and based on the worker-peasant alliance. What is this dictatorship for? Its first function is to suppress the reactionary classes and elements and those exploiters in our country who resist the socialist revolution, to suppress those who try to wreck our socialist construction, or in other words, to resolve the internal contradictions between ourselves and the enemy. For instance, to arrest, try and sentence certain counterrevolutionaries, and to deprive landlords and bureaucrat-capitalists of their right to vote and their freedom of speech for a specified period of time – all this comes within the scope of our dictatorship. To maintain public order and safeguard the interests of the people, it is likewise necessary to exercise dictatorship over embezzlers, swindlers, arsonists, murderers, criminal gangs and other scoundrels who seriously disrupt public order. The second function of this dictatorship is to protect our country from subversion and possible aggression by external enemies. In that event, it is the task of this dictatorship to resolve the external contradiction between ourselves and the enemy. The aim of this dictatorship is to protect all our people so that they can devote themselves to peaceful labour and build China into a socialist country with a modern industry, agriculture, science and culture.
Chairman Mao Ts-Tung
Little Red Book
On the Correct Handling of Contradictions Among the People
(February 27, 1957), 1st pocket ed., pp. 6-7.
[Yeah, I’m a day late with this one. Does anyone even know how many people were murdered by this government whose aim was to “protect all our people” in the next 30 years after this proclamation was made? All dictators claim they are going to be benevolent and they will only crack down on the criminals. Of course then Ayn Rand’s line from Atlas Shrugged immediately comes to mind. Which is precisely the situation we have with gun laws today and under an Obama regime things will only get worse. And all in the pursuit of an Utopian vision of a discredited philosopher with very little real world experience on the subjects he wrote about and who died over 100 years ago.–Joe]
Park carry minutia
Uncle pointed out the video testimony in the house on National Park carry. I find it interesting that a letter written over a year ago by a bigot at the Department of Interior was brought up and challenged.
That letter has been a topic of mine before (and here).
I hope she is feeling the heat. Bigots opposed to fundamental rights guaranteed by our constitution have no place in our government.
Can bloggers make a difference?
Sometimes you might think you are just “preaching to the choir” and the people that can make a difference don’t listen no matter what you do.
Then there are other times when you think maybe someone in a position of power is paying attention:
| Domain Name | senate.gov ? (U.S. Government) | |||||||||||||||||||
| IP Address | 156.33.24.# (U.S. Senate Sergeant at Arms) | |||||||||||||||||||
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| Time of Visit | Feb 25 2008 7:56:41 am | |||||||||||||||||||
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| Visit Length | 2 minutes 44 seconds | |||||||||||||||||||
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| Referring URL | http://www.google.co… state park firearms | |||||||||||||||||||
| Search Engine | google.com | |||||||||||||||||||
| Search Words | idaho state park firearms | |||||||||||||||||||
| Visit Entry Page | https://blog.joehuffman.org/ | |||||||||||||||||||
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| Visitor’s Time | Feb 25 2008 10:56:41 am | |||||||||||||||||||
| Visit Number | 255,384 |
| Domain Name | senate.gov ? (U.S. Government) | |||||||||||||||||||
| IP Address | 156.33.24.# (U.S. Senate Sergeant at Arms) | |||||||||||||||||||
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| Browser | Internet Explorer 7.0 Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 7.0; Windows NT 5.1; InfoPath.2) |
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| Time of Visit | Feb 25 2008 7:23:21 am | |||||||||||||||||||
| Last Page View | Feb 25 2008 7:25:12 am | |||||||||||||||||||
| Visit Length | 1 minute 51 seconds | |||||||||||||||||||
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| Visit Entry Page | https://blog.joehuffman.org/2008/02/22/wooo-hooo-/ | |||||||||||||||||||
| Visit Exit Page | https://blog.joehuffman.org/2008/02/22/wooo-hooo-/ | |||||||||||||||||||
| Out Click | The View From North Central Idaho https://blog.joehuffman.org/ |
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| Visitor’s Time | Feb 25 2008 10:23:21 am | |||||||||||||||||||
| Visit Number | 255,369 |
Quote of the day–Megan McArdle
When the government controls your paycheck, your housing, and your ration card, it doesn’t need to put you in jail; you are in jail.
Megan McArdle
February 25, 2008
HOPELESS IN HAVANA
[I fear we are about to learn this lesson first hand.
H/T to Kirby for the email pointing this out.–Joe]
Quote of the day–Pat Paulsen
Assuming that either the left wing or the right wing gained control of the country, it would probably fly around in circles.
Pat Paulsen
[With all due respect to Paulsen I think the more likely result would be a crash. I wish Paulsen were still alive and running for president this year. We could use the comic relief and perhaps even a viable alternative.–Joe]
Anti-gun proposal body slammed
The headline reads, Moore’s Gun Control Proposal Is Shot Down By County Commissioners. But was more than that. It was more like stripped naked, body slammed, machine gunned, and urinated on:
County Commissioner Marie Moore’s proposed ordinance to restrict firearms use in the county was solidly rejected by her colleagues Monday night and she took a tongue-lashing from irate citizens as well.
Vale resident Sam Houser said that Moore’s proposal was a “waste of money and time” and urged that commissioners reprimand her for violating their rules by springing the idea on them without any discussion or public input at a meeting earlier this month.
Commissioners had scheduled a public hearing on the idea for March 3, but their rejection of the ordinance Monday night ended the need for that.
Moore’s proposal would regulate firearms use near houses and occupied structures, but speaker-after-speaker told commissioners that laws are already on the books that would prosecute anyone who maliciously or careless fires a weapon.
Sheriff Tim Daugherty told commissioners he thought Moore’s proposal was unenforceable and said he didn’t want his deputies wasting their time chasing down and investigating calls that would result if the ordinance passed.
Commissioner Alex Patton, who made the motion to kill Moore’s proposal, said that he had received more than 100 emails and 30 phone calls, and not a single person he heard from is in favor of the idea.
“It’s not right for Lincoln County,” he said, rejecting Moore’s contention that a public hearing should be held before a final decision was made.
Commissioner Jim Klein said that it was “unfortunate that this ordinance got as far as it did” and said it is “an ordinance that we don’t need in this county.”
Moore retorted that a woman was killed in Maine in 1989 by a stray bullet.
Commissioner Bruce Carlton then weighed in and said that life has risks and it’s not government’s place to remove every hazard from daily life” unless we want what he called a “vanilla world.”
Patton then sealed the fate of the ordinance by saying that common sense can’t be put in an ordinance.
The audience applauded much to Moore’s chagrin.
Chairman Tom Anderson said that he believed we have laws already in place to cover the issues that concerned Moore, and urged residents to be responsible in their use of firearms.
Earlier, Denver resident Jamie Barnes who has complained about what he calls a nuisance puppy mill on Petite Lane, said there were three accidental shootings in the county last year and 177 dog bites with one fatality.
He said that it seems to him that gun owners are more responsible than puppy mill owners.
“I am more afraid that my daughter will be attacked by a dog than shot,” he said.
Only one citizen spoke in favor of Moore’s proposal, noting that he and his wife were working in their garden when “bullets whizzed overhead.”
Patton’s motion to kill the gun control measure passed 4-1, with only Moore in dissent.
I love the “spirited defense” the North Carolina anti-gun bigot put up, “Moore retorted that a woman was killed in Maine in 1989 by a stray bullet.”
Works for me
I have to reluctantly agree with Kim on this one.
More evidence for global warming
Barb says the joke is getting old. I still think it is funny. Maybe I’m just slow on some things.
In any case there is more evidence of global warming climate change:
Are the world’s ice caps melting because of climate change, or are the reports just a lot of scare mongering by the advocates of the global warming theory?
Scare mongering appears to be the case, according to reports from the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) that reveal that almost all the allegedly “lost” ice has come back. A NOAA report shows that ice levels which had shrunk from 5 million square miles in January 2007 to just 1.5 million square miles in October, are almost back to their original levels.
Moreover, a Feb. 18 report in the London Daily Express showed that there is nearly a third more ice in Antarctica than usual, challenging the global warming crusaders and buttressing arguments of skeptics who deny that the world is undergoing global warming.
The Daily express recalls the photograph of polar bears clinging on to a melting iceberg which has been widely hailed as proof of the need to fight climate change and has been used by former Vice President Al Gore during his “Inconvenient Truth” lectures about mankind’s alleged impact on the global climate.
Gore fails to mention that the photograph was taken in the month of August when melting is normal. Or that the polar bear population has soared in recent years.
As winter roars in across the Northern Hemisphere, Mother Nature seems to have joined the ranks of the skeptics.
As the Express notes, scientists are saying the northern Hemisphere has endured its coldest winter in decades, adding that snow cover across the area is at its greatest since 1966. The newspaper cites the one exception — Western Europe, which had, until the weekend when temperatures plunged to as low as -10 C in some places, been basking in unseasonably warm weather.
Around the world, vast areas have been buried under some of the heaviest snowfalls in decades. Central and southern China, the United States, and Canada were hit hard by snowstorms. In China, snowfall was so heavy that over 100,000 houses collapsed under the weight of snow.
Jerusalem, Damascus, Amman, and northern Saudi Arabia report the heaviest falls in years and below-zero temperatures. In Afghanistan, snow and freezing weather killed 120 people. Even Baghdad had a snowstorm, the first in the memory of most residents.
As people continue to push for restrictions on human activities to prevent global warming climate change you know it has to be they have an agenda other than what they claim it is. It is my belief its about desire for government control rather than freedom. Freedom is too scary for most people.
It’s not about preventing crime
A terrible crime is committed so government officials want to Do SomethingTM to prevent it from happening again. Never mind that prior restraint is supposedly illegal. Never mind that what they propose is illegal and a felony. They admit, in virtually the same breath they used to push their proposals, that their proposals won’t work:
But after the news conference, state Sen. John Cullerton, a Chicago Democrat and longtime gun control advocate, acknowledged they would not have prevented the NIU shootings. Authorities have said the NIU gunman legally obtained the weapons he used.
If they know their proposal would not have prevented the crime then it’s obvious their proposal is intended for the stated purpose. It’s about something else. What is that something else? I can’t say for certain. In fact it may be they don’t even know. The question these bigots need to be asked, “Since you know this proposal won’t prevent such crimes, what’s the real reason you advocate more restrictions on firearms?”
ATF job description
Kevin Cullen is from Boston so it’s no surprise he doesn’t have a clue about guns:
So, some cow chip-kickin’ senator from Louisiana doesn’t want Mike Sullivan, the US attorney in Boston, to become head of the US Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms because Sullivan wants to make it harder for people to get guns.
Um, isn’t that what the head of the ATF is supposed to do?
Let me spell it out for you Mr. Cullen, you’re from Boston so I understand the concepts are difficult for you.
The head of the ATF, just like all other government officials are required to uphold the constitution. Until such time as the Bill of Rights is declared null and void it is the NOT the job of the head of the ATF to make it harder for people to get guns. In fact the “Head of the ATF” should be actually be the CEO of a convenience store by the same name (actually you should tack the ‘E’ on to the end of it but I’m not going to complain if that market is handled by a separate chain that specializes).
The middle ground at Hillary’s gun summit
As pointed out by others (and here) Hillary wants a gun summit:
“I believe we really should have a summit where everybody comes together on all sides of this issue,” Clinton said. “Let’s figure out how we can be consistent with the Second Amendment, which I wholeheartedly support, and do more to keep people safe.
“I think we can do that, but it’s going to require us all to maybe give a little and understand the point of view of the other people,” she said. “That’s something I would do as President to really bring people together.”
I’m all for reaching a middle ground. In fact I have given this a lot of thought in the past and already determined what the middle ground looks like. Just adopt my position and everyone will save a lot of time and energy.
And even if my reasonable compromise isn’t acceptable do not forget Sean’s valuable insight.