Tag Archives: politics

They Don’t Clash

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New Jersey has a new gun control law, one which Governor Phil Murphy (D) signed just last week.

Under the new law, concealed carry is not allowed in “high-density” locations, places with vulnerable populations or where there is First Amendment or government activity.

New Jerseyans can’t exercise their Second Amendment rights where they’re exercising their First Amendment rights? How does that work, exactly? The two sets of rights are synergistic, not conflicting.

And of what is Murphy’s government so terrified that his administration’s “activities” need to be protected from the people for whom he works?

There’s this fillip, too:

The new law also restricts who is ineligible to obtain a carry permit, including those with an outstanding arrest [warrant]….

But not convicted of the charge. So much for innocent until proven guilty in New Jersey.

And

…four endorsements of character from non-related references must be provided with applications.

Those four endorsers, too, each will be…interviewed…by Murphy’s government men. Murphy’s government not only is tracking New Jersey citizens who have firearms, now he intends to track those who support those who have firearms, also.

Never mind that the Supreme Court’s rulings in NY State Rifle and Pistol Association v Bruen, District of Columbia v Heller, and McDonald v City of Chicago individually and together acknowledged that the right of us Americans to keep and bear Arms is an individual right rather than a collective one, and that they acknowledged that we don’t have to satisfy Government of any sort of “need” or “suitability of purpose” in our keeping and bearing. Never mind, either, that the rulings also required carry permit issuance to be based on strictly objective criteria, not on a government functionary’s wholly subjective assessment of “character” references.

The opening line of our Constitution—the opening phrase—is We the People of the United States.  It’s our Constitution, not Government’s. We are sovereign in our nation, not Government. It’s our obligation to enforce our rights; Government can act (and should), legitimately, only to assist us, not to usurp our duties. We defend our nation; Government acts in our name for us, not in its own name for itself.

Our Second Amendment rights are critical to all of that. Without our individual, personal keep[ing] and bear[ing] Arms, we cannot do any of that. That’s why our right shall not be infringed. Especially where First Amendment or government activities are occurring.

This is one example of why we can’t trust gun control pushers. They have no understanding whatsoever of our Bill of Rights and, by extension, of our Constitution.

Maybe

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The Wuhan Virus has been spreading rapidly throughout the People’s Republic of China since President Xi Jinping lifted the Virus-related restrictions he’d been imposing for the last three years.

Sun Yang, a deputy director of the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, presented the figures [250 million infected with the Virus since the restrictions were lifted] during a closed-door meeting of high-level officials, according to the Financial Times. The figure, which accounts for 18% of the population, includes 37 million people who were infected on Tuesday [20 Dec] alone.

Some think this outbreak also will give an indication of the “true” lethality of the Omicron variant of the Wuhan Virus, since that seems to be the prevalent version in this outbreak. After all,

In countries including the US, high levels of Omicron-fueled infections are translating into less severe disease compared with earlier waves.
But Covid-19 vaccines and prior infections have bolstered immune defenses in the US and elsewhere, public-health experts said, lowering risks of hospitalization and death as the pandemic goes on.

However, a lethality assessment based on the PRC’s outcomes would require that PRC government-published data can be believed. That government routinely downplays and conceals infection and mortality rates related to its three-years of Virus presence (along with inaccurate reporting of a host of other, unrelated, data—for instance, the nation’s economic performance).

Tracking Omicron’s impact in [the PC] will be a challenge because undercounted deaths could obscure its deadliness and blind residents to the full danger, public-health experts said. They, along with relatives of deceased patients, have said they think the government isn’t publicizing the full toll from the virus.

For instance:

[The PRC’s] National Health Commission said there had been no new deaths [since 20 Dec]—and that it was retracting one of the Beijing fatalities from the official tally of Covid’s toll. No explanation was given.

The PRC’s NHC also has…altered…its definition of death by Wuhan Virus: henceforth it can only be by pneumonia or respiratory failure linked directly to the coronavirus; the presence of other factors—heart disease or any other comorbidity, even if only a co-factor, with the Virus the primary cause (by objective criteria)—mean the Virus could not possibly have been the cause of death.

Preventing Future Omnibus Bills

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Chris Jacobs, Juniper Research Group founder and CEO, in his 23 December Wall Street Journal op-ed, offered a solution, but he made this error that’s fatal to his proposal.

But because the Senate parliamentarian allowed Democrats to create new slush funds for domestic spending with a simple majority via budget reconciliation in 2021, a future Republican Congress can do the same….

No. Two wrongs, as the saying goes, do not make a right. Republicans doing this because the other party does it is what Progressive-Democratic Party members do.

Aside from that, it’s simply a wrong thing to do, whether tit-for-tat or simply reconciliation. The better answer is to pass budgets and appropriations bills through truly regular order: get rid of reconciliation altogether and pass the money bills—or not—in the same way as other bills get passed or stopped.

There’s one other step required. One (ideally both) of the houses of Congress needs to enact a rule barring omnibus bills: only the single budget and the dozen separate appropriations bills can be considered.

If government shuts down as a result of money impass, there’s a big so what. The Obama Shutdown, the Schumer Shutdown, all the other shutdowns show how little government is missed.

This—Jacobs’ solution or mine—will remain pie in the sky, though, since we’re dealing with politicians and not persons representing their constituencies. That requires us, We the People, to get off our…couches…and fire those who don’t represent us once they get to DC and hire those who do. That will take two or three election cycles to drive the point home. Three to complete a cleansing of the Senate.

Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious People. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.

Show Me the Logs

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One of the latest Twitter Files batch demonstrated that Old Twitter and the FBI colluded to suppress FBI-disparaged information and that the FBI paid Old Twitter’s costs in the doing to the tune of more than $3.4 million dollars. The Twitter File release carried, among other things, email exchanges between FBI worthies and then-Twitter functionaries talking about the exchanges and the payment for the quid pro quo.

Of course the FBI, in its best wide-eyed innocent Dondi impression, denies any such kind of interaction.

We are providing it [the input] so that they can take whatever action they deem appropriate under their terms of service to protect their platform and protect their customers, but we never direct or ask them to take action[.]

An example of the FBI’s “input:”

Hello Twitter contacts, FBI San Francisco is notifying you of the below accounts which may potentially constitute violations of Twitter’s Terms of Service for any action or inaction deemed appropriate within Twitter policy[.]

However, FBI officials insist

We did no [sic] request anything of the sort.
We focus on activities attributed to foreign actors, not on the content or narrative[.]

But for the non-requests, Old Twitter functionaries bragged about the payments.

Jim [then-Deputy General Counsel Baker], FYI, in 2019 SCALE instituted a reimbursement program for our legal process response from the FBI. Prior to the start of the program, Twitter chose not to collect under this statutory right of reimbursement for the time spent processing requests from the FBI. I am happy to report we have collected $3,415,323 since October 2019!

This, too, FBI officials…demurred from.

…[the payment was just] reasonable costs and expenses associated with their response to a legal process…for complying with legal requests, and a standard procedure.
…
We don’t just reimburse Twitter….

Well then, FBI Director Chris Wray. Show us the logs. Show us the notes taken by the FBI agents in their conversations with Twitter functionaries. Show us the accounting books.

Overreach

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The New York banking regulator, the New York State Department of Financial Services, has announced “rules” that would require banks of all sizes to consider climate change in their risk assessment considerations. NYSDF’s rules are made the worse because it has outsized influence due to the plethora of Wall Street institutions in the State.

Banks would be called upon to look at climate-related risks when bringing on new clients and when extending credit.

This is naked government overreach, even at the State level, and it’s one more reason financial institutions should leave New York. I can suggest Miami, Austin, Dallas, Sioux Falls, and Fargo as alternative locations.

It’s more than that, though. It’s an…inaccurate…goal. The only climate-related risk any American business, banking or other, faces is Government behavior vis-à-vis government bureaucrat-perceived climate situations.