The Second Amendment: Does Anybody But Me Understand It?

Via Michael

 

(Editor’s Note: I wrote this and first posted it in 2011. Since then, the Supreme Court issued the Heller decision. With the recent assassination of Justice Antonin Scalia, the 2A may be in play again. But even Nino Scalia, who wrote the opinion, didn’t get it right. I did…as shown below.)

The so-called conservatives say that there should be no restrictions to keep and bear arms for Americans. They say that it’s all about self-protection.

The so-called liberals beat the drum for outright bans on firearms, saying that disarming Americans will make our nation safer.

Both of them are wrong.

The Second Amendment to the US Constitution reads:

“A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”

Let’s spend a few minutes using our powers of reason to just simply read and understand.

Take the first two phrases. Any way you rearrange the words, the message is that a well-regulated Militia is necessary to the security of a free State. The Founders were talking about the thirteen sovereign nations, each considered a State in the same manner as any other sovereign nation around the world. They had no intention that the united States were to be considered a new nation. They were equals to Great Britain, France, Italy, Spain, etc…and every one of the European nations used militias. For more about the use of militias in history, visit Militia at Wikipedia.

More @ Dump DC

Merrick Garland: “.... is probably the most anti-gun Supreme Court nomination in decades,”

Via Billy

 

President Obama tried to tap a moderate to fill the seat of the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, but he ended up picking a fight with powerful Second Amendment groups that say Judge Merrick Garland has shown antipathy toward gun rights.

In one 2000 case, Judge Garland, who sits on the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, upheld a Clinton administration effort to store gun-buyers’ records.

Later in the decade, he joined other judges in a failed bid to reconsider the landmark case that would eventually establish the Second Amendment’s protection of a personal right to bear arms.

More @ The Washington Times

THINK HE WAS RAISED IN A LOVING TWO PARENT HOUSEHOLD?

Via comment by Anonymous on Trump Anti-Hillary Ad

 

More @ The Burning Platform

Anti-Trump Groups Threaten ‘Largest Civil Disobedience Action of the Century’

Via Billy

With little fanfare and almost no news media attention, some of the same radical groups involved in shutting down Donald Trump’s Chicago rally last week are plotting a mass civil disobedience movement to begin next month.

They intend to march across the East Coast in order to spark a “fire that transforms the political climate in America.”

The operation, calling itself Democracy Spring, is threatening “drama in Washington” with the “largest civil disobedience action of the century.” The radicals believe this will result in the arrest of thousands of their own activists.

“We will demand that Congress listen to the People and take immediate action to save our democracy. And we won’t leave until they do — or until they send thousands of us to jail,” the website for Democracy Spring declares, channeling rhetoric from the Occupy movement.

The group is backed by numerous organizations, including the George Soros-funded groups MoveOn.org, the Institute for Policy Studies, and Demos.

More @ Breitbart

NC: The Syndrome’ Documentary Coming to Wilmington

 

-- March 15, 2016

The Syndrome, a new Reset Films documentary being presented by the Pediatric Justice Association about Shaken Baby Syndrome, will be shown in Wilmington, NC, on April 28. The Pediatric Justice Association is an allied organization of ParentalRights.org.

We don’t often forward messages like this from other groups, especially when they involve a cost. But we recognize that the subject of this documentary – parents falsely accused of child abuse due to an improper diagnosis – will be of interest to many of you. So we have opted to share this information so that those who are interested may attend.

To learn more about the presentation, including time, location, and cost,  detailed press release here.

Even if you are not interested, I hope you will understand that by working side-by-side with groups like PJA to protect parental rights, we strengthen our voice and increase our chances of success.

Sincerely,

Michael Ramey
Director of Communications & Research

The British Are Going: 101 Days Until The UK’s Very Own Independence Day From The European Union

Via Billy

It’s 100 days until Britain’s European Union (EU) referendum, and the signs are relatively good at the moment for the Eurosceptics. As we reported earlier: “Although latest polling has the European Union (EU) referendum result virtually tied at 49 per cent Leave to 47 per cent Remain, factoring in the increased likelihood to vote of out voters means the Brexit side would win a convincing victory with 52 per cent of the vote to Remain’s 45 per cent.”

 More @ Breitbart

Trump Anti-Hillary Ad

Via Billy

In Front of White House, Irish Leader Stands Up for His Country’s Abortion Ban

Via Billy

The Eighth Amendment to the Irish Constitution adopted in 1983 reads in part, “The state acknowledges the right to life of the unborn and, with due regard to the equal right to life of the mother, guarantees in its laws to respect, and, as far as practicable, by its laws to defend and vindicate that right.”

After meeting with President Barack Obama at the White House Tuesday, Irish leader Enda Kenny voiced his support for Ireland’s constitutional abortion restrictions during a press conference outside the White House.

When a reporter asked if he supported expanding abortion rights, a staffer quickly tried to preempt by saying, “Next question.”

However, Kenny responded, “We defer to the Eighth Amendment.”

More @ The Blaze

Trump Warns "There Will Be Riots" If He's Denied Nomination: "Bad Things Would Happen"

Via sauced07

 

 Of course irrespective of whether you believe Trump incites violence among supporters he knows are already riled up, he’s unquestionably correct to say that no cadre of politicians commiserating in a smoke-filled backroom should be allowed to subvert the will of the electorate.

***********************

 

Two days ago, courtesy of Bloomberg, we outlined how the (extremely perturbed and after Tuesday completely decimated) GOP establishment would go about stealing the Republican nomination from Donald Trump.

“Although everyone now jokes about just how unstoppable the Trump ‘juggernaut’ has become, the establishment isn’t called ‘the establishment,’ for nothing,” we said. “Trump may have proven remarkably adept at whipping certain sectors of the electorate into a veritable frenzy, but he himself will tell you that he’s no politician.” The bottom line: he may be a wily, braggadocious, billionaire but he doesn’t know all of the tricks of the political trade. That could - and likely does - mean that Republicans are already working behind the scenes to figure out how to rob him at the last minute.

There’s all sorts of ways for crafty, career politicians to rig the delegates and use procedural maneuvers at the convention to undercut Trump and you can read the full account here, but suffice to say, a Trump nomination is far from a sure thing and the more he attacks the establishment the more willing they’ll be to use any means at their disposal to stop him.

But Trump has a ...er... trump card.

More @ Zero Hedge

Republican Official Tells CNBC: We Choose the Nominee, Not the People

Via sauced07

And there you have it– 

 

The pride and smugness of the Republican Party elites in full display. 

 

Republican convention rules member Curly Haugland told CNBC today that the delegates choose the GOP nominee, not the people. 

CNBC reported:

Political parties, not voters, choose their presidential nominees, a Republican convention rules member told CNBC, a day after GOP front-runner Donald Trump rolled up more big primary victories.

“The media has created the perception that the voters choose the nomination. That’s the conflict here,” Curly Haugland, an unbound GOP delegate from North Dakota, told CNBC’s “Squawk Box” on Wednesday. He even questioned why primaries and caucuses are held.

Haugland is one of 112 Republican delegates who are not required to cast their support for any one candidate because their states and territories don’t hold primaries or caucuses.

Even with Trump’s huge projected delegate haul in four state primaries Tuesday, the odds are increasing the billionaire businessman may not ultimately get the 1,237 delegates needed to claim the GOP nomination before the convention.

More @ The Gateway Pundit

Excellence Personified: Grand National Shag Dance Championships 2015 1st place Carolina Classic Division

One Mo' Time: CBM: East Carolina Girls....Best In The World

The Muckraker and the War

 

 

It was the spring of 1865 . . . the remnants of what once had been Confederate regiments had stacked their arms, the tattered battle flags were furled, the cause which had been so gallantly defended was lost and one by one the Army of Northern Virginia, the Army of Tennessee and the Army of the Trans-Mississippi were disbanded. Those who had opposed these ragged veterans on the field of battle, while they may not have fully understood why their Southern foes had fought so fiercely, they did respect their bravery and dedication. Northern politicians, on the other hand, continued to wave the bloody shirt for more than a decade and exact reconstructive retribution from the prostrate body of the South. There were others in the North, however, who viewed the South in a far more sympathetic light, and were willing to publicly express such feelings. One such person was the noted writer for McClure’s Magazine in New York, Ida Minerva Tarbell.

At the beginning of the Twentieth Century, what the media now refers to as investigative journalism was then known as muckraking, and one of the foremost writers in this genre was Ida Tarbell. Miss Tarbell was born in Pennsylvania in 1857, and a few years later her father became an early oil producer in the town of Titusville.

More @ The Abbeville Institute

NYT Visits Trump Office, Amazed By Presence Of Non-Whites

I'm amazed that they reported it.

TRU NEWS

The New York Times published a profile of a Donald Trump campaign office in Florida, expressing astonishment at the number of non-white people and immigrants working in it.

 Recently, the media have honed in on the support Trump has received from white supremacists, and the various positions he takes — such as opposition to illegal immigration — that are allegedly racist callbacks to the days of the Ku Klux Klan.

 

 But when the Times profiled a Trump campaign office in Tampa, Florida, it found a diverse group of Trump supporters that included numerous immigrants.

 

“For a campaign frequently depicted as offering a rallying point for the white working class, the people volunteering to help Mr. Trump here are noteworthy for their ethnic diversity,” the report says. “They include a young woman who recently arrived from Peru; an immigrant from the Philippines; a 70-year-old Lakota Indian; a teenage son of Russian immigrants; a Mexican-American.”

NC: Back Then - Mothball fleet meant summer jobs

Via Bob

From the StarNews archives

I got several notes from folks about the mothballed Liberty Ships that once lined the Brunswick River -- another fascinating little piece of local history.

Former Wilmington Mayor Hamilton Hicks Jr. sent in this memory:

I found your March 2 story on the Liberty ships quite interesting, as a small group of us once worked in those Brunswick River marshes. The attached picture, even though it has aged, shows the eight of us, all recent NHHS graduates, after the last working day mud fight. Let me give you some background on the work we did.

More @ Star News Online

Why The War Was Not About Slavery

 

Conventional wisdom of the moment tells us that the great war of 1861—1865 was “about” slavery or was “caused by” slavery. I submit that this is not a historical judgment but a political slogan. What a war is about has many answers according to the varied perspectives of different participants and of those who come after. To limit so vast an event as that war to one cause is to show contempt for the complexities of history as a quest for the understanding of human action.

Two generations ago, the most perceptive historians, much more learned than the current crop, said that the war was “about” economics and was “caused by” economic rivalry. The war has not changed one bit since then. The perspective has changed. It can change again as long as people have the freedom to think about the past. History is not a mathematical calculation or scientific experiment but a vast drama of which there is always more to be learned.

I was much struck by Barbara Marthal’s insistence in her Stone Mountain talk on the importance of stories in understanding history. I entirely concur. History is the experience of human beings. History is a story and a story is somebody’s story. It tells us about who people are. History is not a political ideological slogan like “about slavery.” Ideological slogans are accusations and instruments of conflict and domination. Stories are instruments of understanding and peace.

More @ The Abbeville Instiitute