Sunday, March 18, 2018

(Another) open letter to Marco Rubio, about the trump.

Mr Rubio,

Like many Americans, I have many issues with mr trump. But I have three specific things I wanted to call to your attention.

All of these fall squarely under checks and balances and you can and very well should be working on American interests, rather than your own self interests or that of your party.

(1) the Russian influence issue. Congress abandoned their work and claimed no collusion. In the public, given the testimony we have seen, and the revelations from assorted agencies and the media we can clearly see this is not accurate. I urge you to keep fighting for answers on the senate intelligence committee - specifically, we all heard Russia targeted you, so this is crucial to our democracy.

I also can not state this strongly enough: the mueller probe must be allowed to continue unfettered and you must protect it from the whims of mr trump. If it turns out there was no actual, illegal collusion so be it. But we deserve to know.

(2) mr trump has said himself that he fired mr Comey, and now mr McCabe for purely political reasons and to protect himself from further inquiry. This would seem to this layman to be a case of obstruction of justice. You have the power to hold him accountable. You must exercise that power.

And (3) in his revolving door of White House staff and cabinet members, mr trump appears to be leaving much to chance. The people around him should be helping manage the many things in his purveyance. But he's taking a lot on himself and appears inept at doing so.

The larger problem is with his Secretary of State. In firing mr tillerson, he has now - reportedly - inserted his daughter into the role. She has no security clearance. She has no specific position. She has no skills, and relies on somewhat warped sense of nepotistic entitlement. And she was never vetted or confirmed by the senate to represent the United States in any such capacity.

It is incumbent on you to reign him in.

Checks and balances, Senator. I call on you to provide the check. And it must be done with haste.

Tuesday, March 13, 2018

Stephen Hawking

Professor Hawking was an inspiration to me.  Although he was stricken with a disease, his indomitable spirit persevered. His brilliant mind still challenged us all to think and grow, and helped us to always keep learning.

Here’s a fun interview he did with Colbert.

And in the early 2000s, Peter Diamandis ran ZeroG - a company that took people on parabolic flights so they could experience periods of weightlessness.  ZeroG got you as close as possible to going into space.

Diamandis heard that Hawking wanted to go into space, so he made it happen!


Godspeed Professor Hawking. The world needs more people with your intelligence.

Sunday, March 11, 2018

Being special

Some people enjoy priveledge.  Often it’s white male, Christian priveledge. The people living it like being special, and being different. And don’t want to extend their specialness to others.

So when you hear from some folks that they don’t want others to have the same special rights, or powers, or status it is about them losing that feeling of being special.

For those who aren’t in that status, it’s about equality.  It’s not that they want to take away what you have, it’s that they want to experience the same things.

For years, there was segregation, and men’s only clubs.  Then, that broke down and people complained.  Now it’s about gay rights, multi cultural things, religion, etc. The end result will be the same.  Life moves forward, and we can’t hop back to a “simpler time” (code, by the way, for when there was where more white priveledge and you didn’t hear the complaints)

I think this movie clip sums it up well -


Saturday, March 10, 2018

More food for thought: Justice Scalia’s Gun-Control Argument - The New York Times

"We also recognize another important limitation on the right to keep and carry arms. 'Miller' said, as we have explained, that the sorts of weapons protected were those 'in common use at the time.' 307 U.S., at 179, 59 S.Ct. 816. We think that limitation is fairly supported by the historical tradition of prohibiting the carrying of 'dangerous and unusual weapons.'"


https://takingnote.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/12/11/justice-scalias-gun-control-argument/


Short. Sweet. To the point. That's the beauty Dave's iPhone. 

Food for thought. The NRA once supported gun control - Salon.com

The NRA President at the time, Karl T. Frederick, a 1920 Olympic gold-medal winner for marksmanship who became a lawyer, praised the new state gun controls in Congress. "I have never believed in the general practice of carrying weapons," he testified before the 1938 law was passed. "I do not believe in the general promiscuous toting of guns. I think it should be sharply restricted and only under licenses."

https://www.salon.com/2013/01/14/the_nra_once_supported_gun_control/

Tuesday, March 6, 2018

Gun rights and the constitution. #MakeAmericaSmartAgain

As we all know, the constitution is a document that was intended to provide a framework for governing. But it was always intended to grow and change as the country did.

It was written in September 1787, and wasn't ratified (ie adopted by the states via a vote) until almost a year later, in June 1788.

And then they set about amending it. The first set of 12 amendments were submitted in September of 1789 (a year after the constitution was ratified), and 10 of them made it through the process to become the "bill of rights;" these were finally ratified around 2 years later in December 1791.

The thing is that the founding fathers knew that the document would need to evolve, and they'd have to adjust it to keep up with the times via the amendment process. Hence why the first group was a bill of rights - they wanted to set forth the guidelines for how the citizens of the nation would be treated.

Those 10 amendments in short are:

1. Freedom of speech, religion, and the press. - the idea was to allow free expression so all would be welcome to take part and we could essentially keep ourselves in check.

2. Bearing arms. - this is the most debated amendment. Essentially it allowed for militiamen (those serving the country before there was a standing army) to be able to defend it, owing to the British still very much interested in the America's. And perhaps more importantly, it was a nod to slave owners in the south; they would be able to use arms as a means to protect their "investments"

3. Ensuring that private residences wouldn't be commandeered by the government - this happened at times during the revolution and was a legitimate concern

4. Illegal search and seizure. - another way to be sure that individuals have a right to privacy, and prevents against the government overreaching

5. Certain legalities like double jeopardy, grand juries, due process and so forth. - and more about how citizens were to be treated.

6. Right to a fair and speedy trial - another way to bestow on citizens the ability to not be treated unfairly.

7. Trial by jury - yet more legal information to ensure blind justice.

8. Fines, bail, and cruel & unusual punishment. - this aims to protect citizens from their government doing anything to cause undue expenses.

9. Unenumerated; Ensures that other rights are bestowed on the citizens.

And 10. Federalism so that the federal government works for the people and ensures states maintain some power.

Since that time, 11,500 amendments have been proposed. But only 17 more actually were ratified.

The large number of possible changes reflect that this country can and should evolve its document over time. And the fact that only 17 were ratified shows just how hard it is. Let's take a peek at the others.

11. States can't be sued by someone from out of state (1795)

12. President & VP elected together (1804)

13. Abolition (1865)

14. Citizenship, equal protection (states treated equally) (1868)

15. Allows blacks the right to vote (1870)

16. Income tax and apportionment (1913)

17. Senator election by popular vote (1913)

18. Prohibition (1919)

19. Suffragette (women's right to vote) (1920)

20. Presidential terms (1933)

21. Prohibition repeal (1933)

22. Presidential term limits (1951)

23. DC receives electoral votes (1961)

24. Prohibiting poll tax (1964)

25. Presidential succession (1967)

26. 18 year old voting age (1971)

And 27. Congressional salary (1992 though to be fair it was in effect starting in 1789, it was never ratified)

So there you have it. A living and breathing document that has evolved with the times. It was altered to eliminate slavery, allow people to vote, not allow a president to serve 4 terms after teddy roosevelt, change succession after Kennedy's assassination, and to prohibit alcohol and reinstate it.

So anyone who tells you the constitution can't be changed is lying.

And that brings us back to the 2nd amendment. It's so stuck in time. We have a standing army. We don't have slavery. And surely not even the most forward thinking person could have ever imagined a weapon like an assault rifle.

It's time to consider a 28th amendment that more clearly defines what weapons may be owned and perhaps that it need to be registered and the owner has specific requirements to keep it.

C'mon man. Do you really think a few guns would fend off an actual army? That's just folly. So why do you need to protect yourself against *that*?

I'm sure folks in 1919 never in their wildest dreams would have thought they couldn't have beer or whiskey. Yet congress did it anyway. And then they changed it again.

Monday, February 26, 2018

What America is getting wrong about three important words in the Second Amendment – Quartz

Source: 


On Wednesday night, CNN hosted a town hall about gun violence with members of the community of Parkland, Florida, which only a week earlier had experienced a mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School. Seventeen students and teachers lost their lives.

The town hall was remarkable in many ways, not least for a question asked by the school's history teacher, Diane Wolk Rogers, about a portion of the US Constitution's Second Amendment from 1791, which states: "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."

"What is your definition of a 'well-regulated militia,' as stated in the Second Amendment?" Rogers asked Dana Loesch, a spokesperson for the National Rifle Association (NRA). "And using supporting detail, explain to me how an 18-year-old with a military rifle is well-regulated? And the world, our country, our nation, is going to grade your answer."

Loesch responded: "George Mason was one of the founding fathers, and he said 'The militia is the whole of the people.' It's every man, it's every woman, that is who the militia is. In the context of the time, a well-regulated militia meant an American man, an American woman, a citizen of the United States of America, who could operate and service their firearm."

If she were taking a history exam, Loesch's response would likely have scored an F.

Mason, a Virginia politician and anti-Federalist, was one of only three delegates to the US Constitutional Convention of 1787 to refuse to sign the Constitution. He authored the Virginia Declaration of Rights, which later served as an influence for the United States Bill of Rights—and it was during the debates at the Virginia Ratifying Convention, where many of the ideas for the Bill of Rights would be generated, that he spoke the words Loesch used in her answer.

Loesch's intent, in using this particular quote, was likely to show that one of America's founding fathers, who provided inspiration for the Bill of Rights itself, believed that every person in the country had the right to own a gun, and that owning and operating a gun made them part of the militia. Therefore, as part of the militia, their right to own guns cannot be infringed.

But Mason's quote doesn't just mean something different "in the context of the time." It means something entirely different in the context of the actual, complete quote. Loesch's misreading, deliberate or otherwise, not only undermines the grounds on which she and the NRA base their definition of a "well-regulated militia" and who belongs to it, but subverts her authority to speak to what the Founding Fathers intention was in creating the Second Amendment.

Here is George Mason's quote in full, as recorded in the transcripts of the Virginia Ratifying Convention:

"I ask, Who are the militia? They consist now of the whole people, except a few public officers. But I cannot say who will be the militia of the future day. If that paper on the table gets no alteration, the militia of the future day may not consist of all classes, high and low, and rich and poor; but they may be confined to the lower and middle classes of the people, granting exclusion to the higher classes of the people."

If this seems a tad different than what Loesch was trying to say—that the Second Amendment means that all gun owners are part of the "militia"—that's because it is.

Mason's statement at the Virginia Ratifying Convention was a criticism of Article 1, Section 8 of the US Constitution, which gave Congress the power "to provide for organizing, arming and disciplining the militia." Mason's fear was that if Congress had this power, they would decide to only conscript the poor into service. Not an unreasonable fear, mind you, given the way most wars have gone. It is often the poor fighting and dying, while the rich enlist in champagne units or sit at home tending to their "bone spurs."

In this speech, Mason also voiced his concern that a government that is too small and too far away from the people it represents would result in representatives having no "fellow-feeling for the people." He feared that they would then inflict "ignominious punishments and heavy fines" on those who chose not to participate in the militia, or exempt people in their own class from service. He thus proposed a clause "exempting the militia from martial law except when in actual service, and from fines and punishments of an unusual nature."

Given the fact that women were rarely permitted to serve in state militias in a fighting capacity at that time, it is also highly unlikely that Mason considered them part of it. No one was that progressive at the time.

Mason's speech was about class, it was about military service, it was about the power of the United States government to require military service. It had absolutely nothing to do with an individual right to own assault rifles simply because you feel like owning an assault rifle. Even if you believe in an individual right to own guns, even if you believe that is what the Second Amendment guarantees, it is clear that this particular quote was not about that.

Despite this, this quote has long been a favorite of the NRA and those advocating against gun control. The most common variation—one notably used by former US attorney general John Ashcroft in a letter to the NRA assuring them of his belief in an individual right to bear arms —is, in fact, an amalgamation of this quote and an entirely different thing Mason said two days before.

"I ask, Sir, what is the militia? It is the whole people… To disarm the people is the best and most effectual way to enslave them."

Mason's words, when read like this, seem like a perfect and romantic validation of everything the NRA believes in—that not only does the Constitution provide a bulwark against gun control, but that the very reason the Second Amendment gives them this right is for the purpose of keeping a tyrannical government at bay. This is why it shows up so often on message boards and lists of quotes meant to prove this point. When Loesch quoted Mason, she likely knew that many of her fellow gun enthusiasts would fill in the blanks with the rest of the "quote" themselves. It was meant to perk up the ears of those who believe that the true purpose of the Second Amendment is to give gun owners the ability to overthrow the government if necessary, that this is what the Founding Fathers intended.

The second part of the "quote," however, literally refers to a state militia, organized for the defense of the nation, not people owning guns for fun and sport:

"Forty years ago, when the resolution of enslaving America was formed in Great Britain, the British Parliament was advised by an artful man, who was governor of Pennsylvania, to disarm the people; that it was the best and most effectual way to enslave them; but that they should not do it openly, but weaken them, and let them sink gradually, by totally disusing and neglecting the militia. […] This was a most iniquitous project. Why should we not provide against the danger of having our militia, our real and natural armed strength, destroyed? The general government ought, at the same time, to have some such power. But we need not give them power to abolish our militia. If they neglect to arm them, and prescribe proper discipline, they will be of no use."

This, again, is very, very different from the way the cobbled-together "quote" used by Ashcroft and others makes it sound. Mason was not talking about taking guns that people purchased themselves away, but rather about not providing them with arms, training and discipline, as is necessary for a military unit to function. It is fair to say that, were the government to get involved with the "training and discipline" of everyone in the country who owns a gun, the NRA would have a pretty big problem with it.

Mason may well have believed in a personal right to arms outside the function of a militia, he may have even believed that the right to have arms in order to overthrow the government. That is not at all what he was talking about in either of these quotes—or, frankly, in anything else he wrote or has been quoted as saying.

It is important to know that, at the time the constitution was signed, there was significant opposition to having a standing army, and state militias were supposed to fill that gap. The state, in turn, was supposed to arm and train them. They were there to suppress insurrections—specifically slave insurrections and anti-tax insurrections like the Whiskey Rebellion, and to fight Native Americanswho, god forbid, wanted to continue living where they were living—not to start them. From the second Military Act of 1792 until the establishment of the National Guard in 1904, all "free, able-bodied white male citizens" were conscripted into state militias and were required to fight at the behest of the government. So yes—guns for certain individuals. But individuals that were trained and disciplined, and not all that free.

Dana Loesch is, of course, free to believe what she believes. She can believe everyone and their four-year-old child should have a gun. She can believe that all people should be considered part of the militia—hell, she can believe all people should be considered part of the cast of Beatlemania!, or the Olympic luge team. The NRA and John Ashcroft are entitled to believe what they believe. However, when you can't defend your belief without taking quotes entirely out of context, disregarding their original intent and history, you may want to consider how successful your argument is in the first place.

Robyn Pennacchia is a freelance writer based in Chicago, IL. You can follow her on twitter at @RobynElyse.