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Gun Rights Do Not Compute, Say Media Cyborgs
Josey1
Member Posts: 9,598 ✭✭
Gun Rights Do Not Compute, Say Media Cyborgs
Richard Poe
May 10, 2002
In the classic "Star Trek" episode "I, Mudd," Captain Kirk short-circuits a dangerous android by talking circles around it. The Bush Justice Department has accomplished something similar, driving the gun-ban movement into a full-fledged system meltdown, with nothing more than a few well-chosen words.
Solicitor General Theodore Olson filed two briefs with the Supreme Court Monday that stated, among other things, that the Second Amendment guarantees to all citizens the right "to possess and bear their own firearms."
No big deal, most Americans would say. We always knew we had a right to keep and bear arms. But the gun-ban cyborgs reacted as if someone had dropped a W32.Klez virus into their brains. One can almost hear the smoke hissing from their ears as they stammer, "This does not compute!"
CBS correspondent Jim Stewart declared that Olson's briefs have reversed "25 years of Justice Department policy."
Brady Center president Michael D. Barnes said the brief has reversed "at least four decades" of federal policy.
New York Times columnist Bob Herbert averred that federal policy has opposed individual gun rights "for more than 60 years."
Abe Lincoln himself opposed individual gun rights, insists Paul Begala of CNN's "Crossfire." Begala says that Olson's brief gives the Second Amendment a "new meaning that no scholar has ever found."
The cyborgs seem confused. Did the government revoke our gun rights 25, 40, 60 or 140 years ago?
John Ydstie of National Public Radio's "All Things Considered" says it happened in 1939, when the Supreme Court ruled in a case called United States v. Miller.
Two gangsters named Jack Miller and Frank Layton had been charged with transporting an unregistered short-barreled or "sawed-off" shotgun across state lines. The National Firearms Act of 1934 imposed special taxes and registration requirements on machine guns and short-barreled shotguns.
It was the first federal gun-control law in America. Ostensibly passed to crack down on gangsters such as Miller and Layton, the law was controversial, since it limited gun rights for all Americans.
The charges against Miller and Layton were dismissed in district court, on the grounds that the National Firearms Act violated states' rights and the Second Amendment. However, prosecutors appealed to the Supreme Court.
That's where the confusion begins. According to media cyborgs, the Supreme Court ruled against Miller and Layton on the grounds that they were not members of a state militia and therefore had no right to keep and bear arms.
But that is not what the court said.
In fact, the court conceded that the gangsters were militiamen, inasmuch as the militia included "all males physically capable of acting in concert for the common defense." However, the justices were not sure whether sawed-off shotguns qualified as militia weapons.
The gangsters might have won their case by arguing that sawed-off shotguns were used by U.S. infantrymen in World War I. However, neither Miller nor Layton nor their attorney showed up in court. Only the prosecution presented a case.
Lacking sufficient evidence to rule on the case, the justices sent it back to the lower court for additional fact-finding. But the fact-finding never took place. Jack Miller was shot dead by unknown assailants. Frank Layton pleaded guilty and got four years' probation.
At best, United States v. Miller ended inconclusively. However, even liberal law professor Sanford Levinson notes that Miller can be construed to mean "that the individual citizen has a right to keep and bear bazookas, rocket launchers, and other armaments that are clearly relevant to modern warfare. ." This is a far cry from the Brady Center's interpretation.
Levinson is a rarity in the legal profession - an honest liberal. Another liberal recently stricken with honesty is Harvard law professor Laurence Tribe. In 1999, Tribe announced that he had finally gotten around to studying the Second Amendment and, wonder of wonders, had discovered that Americans really did have a right to "possess and use firearms in the defense of themselves and their homes."
Unfortunately, Tribe's treatise "American Constitutional Law" - which took a dim view of individual gun rights - had been a standard text in many U.S. law schools since 1978. Tribe revised the 1999 edition to reflect his new thinking. But he was 20 years too late.
Thanks to liberal law professors, generations of lawyers, prosecutors and judges have been indoctrinated with lies about the Second Amendment.
Just as it took generations to undermine gun rights in America, it will take generations to undue the damage. Ted Olson's briefs are a small but important step in that direction.
See NewsMax's special offer for Richard Poe's latest book, "The Seven Myths of Gun Control."
For more columns by Richard Poe, Click here.
Richard Poe is a New York Times best-selling author and cyberjournalist. For more information on Poe and his writings, visit his Web site, RichardPoe.com. He may be reached at richardpoe@aol.com.
http://www.newsmax.com/commentarchive.shtml?a=2002/5/10/135249
"If cowardly and dishonorable men sometimes shoot unarmed men with army pistols or guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary and gallows, and not by a general deprivation of a constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
Richard Poe
May 10, 2002
In the classic "Star Trek" episode "I, Mudd," Captain Kirk short-circuits a dangerous android by talking circles around it. The Bush Justice Department has accomplished something similar, driving the gun-ban movement into a full-fledged system meltdown, with nothing more than a few well-chosen words.
Solicitor General Theodore Olson filed two briefs with the Supreme Court Monday that stated, among other things, that the Second Amendment guarantees to all citizens the right "to possess and bear their own firearms."
No big deal, most Americans would say. We always knew we had a right to keep and bear arms. But the gun-ban cyborgs reacted as if someone had dropped a W32.Klez virus into their brains. One can almost hear the smoke hissing from their ears as they stammer, "This does not compute!"
CBS correspondent Jim Stewart declared that Olson's briefs have reversed "25 years of Justice Department policy."
Brady Center president Michael D. Barnes said the brief has reversed "at least four decades" of federal policy.
New York Times columnist Bob Herbert averred that federal policy has opposed individual gun rights "for more than 60 years."
Abe Lincoln himself opposed individual gun rights, insists Paul Begala of CNN's "Crossfire." Begala says that Olson's brief gives the Second Amendment a "new meaning that no scholar has ever found."
The cyborgs seem confused. Did the government revoke our gun rights 25, 40, 60 or 140 years ago?
John Ydstie of National Public Radio's "All Things Considered" says it happened in 1939, when the Supreme Court ruled in a case called United States v. Miller.
Two gangsters named Jack Miller and Frank Layton had been charged with transporting an unregistered short-barreled or "sawed-off" shotgun across state lines. The National Firearms Act of 1934 imposed special taxes and registration requirements on machine guns and short-barreled shotguns.
It was the first federal gun-control law in America. Ostensibly passed to crack down on gangsters such as Miller and Layton, the law was controversial, since it limited gun rights for all Americans.
The charges against Miller and Layton were dismissed in district court, on the grounds that the National Firearms Act violated states' rights and the Second Amendment. However, prosecutors appealed to the Supreme Court.
That's where the confusion begins. According to media cyborgs, the Supreme Court ruled against Miller and Layton on the grounds that they were not members of a state militia and therefore had no right to keep and bear arms.
But that is not what the court said.
In fact, the court conceded that the gangsters were militiamen, inasmuch as the militia included "all males physically capable of acting in concert for the common defense." However, the justices were not sure whether sawed-off shotguns qualified as militia weapons.
The gangsters might have won their case by arguing that sawed-off shotguns were used by U.S. infantrymen in World War I. However, neither Miller nor Layton nor their attorney showed up in court. Only the prosecution presented a case.
Lacking sufficient evidence to rule on the case, the justices sent it back to the lower court for additional fact-finding. But the fact-finding never took place. Jack Miller was shot dead by unknown assailants. Frank Layton pleaded guilty and got four years' probation.
At best, United States v. Miller ended inconclusively. However, even liberal law professor Sanford Levinson notes that Miller can be construed to mean "that the individual citizen has a right to keep and bear bazookas, rocket launchers, and other armaments that are clearly relevant to modern warfare. ." This is a far cry from the Brady Center's interpretation.
Levinson is a rarity in the legal profession - an honest liberal. Another liberal recently stricken with honesty is Harvard law professor Laurence Tribe. In 1999, Tribe announced that he had finally gotten around to studying the Second Amendment and, wonder of wonders, had discovered that Americans really did have a right to "possess and use firearms in the defense of themselves and their homes."
Unfortunately, Tribe's treatise "American Constitutional Law" - which took a dim view of individual gun rights - had been a standard text in many U.S. law schools since 1978. Tribe revised the 1999 edition to reflect his new thinking. But he was 20 years too late.
Thanks to liberal law professors, generations of lawyers, prosecutors and judges have been indoctrinated with lies about the Second Amendment.
Just as it took generations to undermine gun rights in America, it will take generations to undue the damage. Ted Olson's briefs are a small but important step in that direction.
See NewsMax's special offer for Richard Poe's latest book, "The Seven Myths of Gun Control."
For more columns by Richard Poe, Click here.
Richard Poe is a New York Times best-selling author and cyberjournalist. For more information on Poe and his writings, visit his Web site, RichardPoe.com. He may be reached at richardpoe@aol.com.
http://www.newsmax.com/commentarchive.shtml?a=2002/5/10/135249
"If cowardly and dishonorable men sometimes shoot unarmed men with army pistols or guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary and gallows, and not by a general deprivation of a constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
Comments
Let's keep the pressure on the bastards!!! I'm forwarding these links to everyone in my address book,including my reprsentatives!!!
- Life NRA Member
If dishonorable men shoot unarmed men with army guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary and not by general deprivation of constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
- Life NRA Member
If dishonorable men shoot unarmed men with army guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary and not by general deprivation of constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878