Tag Archives: rights

The Relevance of Constitutionality

Posted on by
Reply

The Wall Street Journal had an editorial Wednesday that decried Progressive-Democrats’ (my term; the editors wrote only of “Democrats”) DC statehood “gambit.” In their piece, the editors made the case that the move, as designed by Congressional Progressive-Democrats, was unconstitutional.

One part of their writing jumped out at me.

But the impetus behind both measures [Supreme Court packing and DC “statehood”] is the same—to tilt the constitutional playing field and consolidate liberal power.

Indeed. It’s important to keep in mind that today’s liberals, far from being classically liberal, are 18th century monarchist, Big Government Knows All/Controls All proponents. For such as these, our Constitution is whatever they say it is—if it has any value at all. Their own hero, Woodrow Wilson, insisted that our Constitution is obsolete and ought be done away with altogether.

Today’s monarchist liberals are bent on the same aim, this time by simply ignoring it.

Stuff and Nonsense

Posted on by
Reply

That’s what my grandmother—a much more gracious woman than I ever have been a man—would call things and behaviors that were utter…foolishness.

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis (R) has signed a law that toughens the penalties for engaging in a variety of acts during riots. Engaging in the riots themselves has long been illegal.

The law, which goes into effect immediately, grants civil legal immunity to people who drive through protesters blocking a road and allows authorities to hold arrested demonstrators from posting bail until after their first court date. The legislation increases the charge for battery on a police officer during a riot and adds language that could force local governments to justify a reduction in law enforcement budgets.
The bill allows people to sue local governments over personal or property damages if they were determined to have interfered with law enforcement response during civil unrest. It also increases penalties for protesters who block roadways or deface public monuments and creates a new crime, “mob intimidation.”

Naturally, the Left is up in arms about the law. Kara Gross, ACLU of Florida Legislative Director and Senior Policy Counsel:

The problem with this bill is that the language is so overbroad and vague…that it captures anybody who is peacefully protesting at a protest that turns violent through no fault of their own. Those individuals who do not engage in any violent conduct under this bill can be arrested and charged with a third-degree felony and face up to five years in prison and loss of voting rights. The whole point of this is to instill fear in Floridians.

Not at all. Those peacefully protesting when their protest turns violent through no fault of their own can leave, and they can show that they were trying to leave if they’re arrested on the way out of the area. It’s their conscious choice to remain or to not try to leave when the violence starts. If they make that choice, they’re no longer peaceful protesters; they’ve created themselves rioters.

Progressive stuff and nonsense.

No Clue

Posted on by
Reply

And doesn’t care. That’s Dr. Anthony Fauci, as he made clear in his…testimony…before the House Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis last Thursday. Congressman Jim Jordan (R, OH) questioned Fauci regarding when Wuhan Virus (my term, not Jordan’s or Fauci’s) situation would be ending and CDC guideline restrictions lifted.

Fauci insisted that the restrictions would begin to be relaxed

When we get the level of infection in this country low enough that it is not a really high threat[.]

Despite repeated questions from Jordan to define “low enough,” Fauci remained evasive, repeatedly refusing to be specific, to identify the number…what metrics, what measures, he would use to define “low enough.”

The clear meaning is that Fauci has no idea at all of when or under what conditions the CDC would recommend the Biden administration stop usurping Americans’

ability to go to houses of worship, a curfew in Ohio last fall, and restrictions on having guests at their homes.

Nor does Fauci care that he has no idea.

Jordan’s time for questioning in the hearing was five minutes (per House rules for hearings), and that’s how long the video at the link lasts. It’s well worth the hearing; it’ll give a clear understanding of Fauci’s uselessness in government.

Accuracy and Truth

Posted on by
Reply

In one of their Tuesday editorials, The Wall Street Journal editorial board wrote about the shooting of Daunte Wright in the Minnesota town of Brooklyn Center. They seemed to be on the right track in their insistence for due process both for Wright and for the police officer who, according to body camera video and audio, fatally shot him.

Sadly, the editors blew up their thesis with this, regarding post-shooting events:

On Monday night protesters looted businesses….

Accuracy, and truth, die at the hands of political correctness.

Protesters don’t loot. Criminals loot.

Protesters don’t riot. Rioters riot.

It’s…dismaying…to see the Newspeak dictionary spread so far.

Soft on Crime

Posted on by
Reply

Especially in Los Angeles County, where County District Attorney George Gascón rules.

Gascón has proposed legislation that would bar felonies committed while a juvenile from being counted as “strikes” under California’s Three Strikes law when the person commits a felony as an adult. Superficially, it seems like a good idea. After all, Gascón argues, the child’s brain isn’t fully developed.

A sister of a gang-related murder victim exposed the flaw in that argument, though. Aja Courtney:

Anybody who has children understands that children know at very early ages what’s right from wrong[.]

Indeed. Virtually from the time the child can walk—and whose new-found mobility lets the child especially explore the matter—he learns the difference between right and wrong. The child starts developing, early on, an understanding of the distinction between the more complex concepts of fair and unfair; these are fully developed in children before they reach puberty.

Then Gascón blew up his own argument while being too absorbed with his own virtue to recognize it:

A juvenile system is based on rehabilitation, not on punishment…criminalization of young people leads to higher levels of recidivism, which means that it creates more insecurity in our community.

And when the juvenile commits a felony as an adult, that rehabilitation effort plainly has failed. Furthermore, young people aren’t criminalized by having the strikes continue to count. They criminalize themselves by continuing to commit crimes.

In the end, too, releasing a man back to the community—or to another community—before he’s been rehabilitated is what creates more insecurity in our community.