The Democratic Debates last night were basically who could out gun control the other candidate. Before Bloomberg came along, the gun control movement had virtually no organization or money. He changed all that. We can pat ourselves on the back that gun people will self-organize in the absence of leadership, but if you have the money to buy a top down organization, it doesn’t make it any less effective.
When super wealthy elites decide they want something, they will usually get their way. They might not with this issue because we have so many people who care. But it’s going to be an all-hands-on-deck fight.
Overarching, and across the world, is the fight over globalism. I’ve said in the end globalism will win, because it’s being driven by technological change at its root. The struggle isn’t whether we have transnational systems where the nation state plays a less important role: that will happen. The struggle is whether globalism will be a democratic movement that is controlled by the people for the people’s benefit, or whether it will be a aristocratic movement that benefits the transnational aristocrats. It’s been set up as the latter, and the people are, across the globe, calling foul.
The struggle over the RKBA is downstream of that fight, but what we’re seeing I think fits in the overall struggle. It’s a theme repeated throughout history that aristocrats do not like their subjects being armed. So it was practically inevitable that when the people started asserting themselves against this cultivated global order, the counter-reaction was the aristocracy returning to their traditional fears and anxieties about armed peasants. That anxiety is acting itself out among the pool of Democratic candidates.
A perfect example of the globalist hatred of RKBA is the EU’s screwing of Switzerlands previously liberal gun laws.
Or New Zealand going full authoritarian on a notoriously law abiding and peaceful citizenry the second they had an excuse to blame the entire population for the actions of one deranged man.
I still don’t see Bloomy as boogieman you see him as.
I think this has way less to do with his money and way more to do with the cyclicle nature of politics.
Plus, Bloomy has only made inroads in the blue states, and purple going blue states. The red states have resisted his money.
One could figure the red states ‘resisting’ his money, but I think that was his covering the bases ‘just in case’.
His wins in the purple states have been to turn them more blueish and use that to influence the introduction and passage of more antigun state laws.
He and his minions figured out that if they can’t get his gun control fantasies actualized in one fell federal swoop, they’ll do it piecemeal, state by state as best they can by getting more proggie legislators to pass gun control laws or by funding the initiative petition process. Whichever way get the job done.
That is what makes him dangerous. Along with funding the campaigns of politicians who will do his bidding, he’s funding a pure direct democracy tyranny of the majority, overruling the constitutional protections of the rights of the minority.
And, it is precisely this federal system that serves as the bulwark against a decisive strike against the 2A.
There are 49 canaries in the 2A coal mine. We gun owners will watch as these 49 canaries fall one by one. We will chant: ‘It can’t happen HERE in my sovereign state of [fill in blank]!’ But, canary by canary, the chanters will watch their states fall.
I don’t think it can get to that. Enough voters will wake-up after they have lost their gun rights in their home states. Their kith and kin in other states will wake-up and smell the stench of Progressivism. Bloomberg will discover that the hill becomes steeper as he progresses toward his goal of the 50’th state (or federal gun control).
Nullification of federal pot laws is paving the way for push-back against federal regulation. 2A Sanctuary Counties are popping up. It will become impossible to enforce either state or federal gun control laws in any jurisdiction where 2A Sanctuary Counties are sprinkled checkerboard style among blue counties.
This is a popular struggle. With the voters in a municipality/county/state stand up for their 2A rights? Or, will they be seduced by the forces of Progressivism. We have to advance this struggle in the courts (the expensive climb to SCOTUS), in state legislature and Congressional elections. This takes votes; votes that can’t be purchased cheaply.
Again, I don’t believe what happened in either the blue states or the purples states has anything to do with Bloomy’s money. I think it was going to happen with out him.
So he isn’t dangerous at all, because he is a complete non-factor.
“The struggle isn’t whether we have transnational systems where the nation state plays a less important role: that will happen. The struggle is whether globalism will be a democratic movement that is controlled by the people for the people’s benefit, or whether it will be a aristocratic movement that benefits the transnational aristocrats.”
“Transnationalism” is the nation state being supplanted by the corporation. Almost by definition corporations are not (small-d) democratic, and historically they are rarely respectful of human or individual rights. Usually they are quite the opposite. Even as customers, people are only a commodity. Like cattle or hogs.
Recently Facebook proposed to issue its own crypto-currency. The issuance of currencies has historically been the role of the nation state.
But there is nothing new under the sun. The Tea Tax that contributed to our American Revolution was essentially a bailout for the East India Company; which at one point had a private army of 260,000 troops, its own navy, and prevailed on Great Britain to effectively annex India on its behalf.
The “Grand Union” flag, which was among early American flags and the Betsy Ross flag appears to have been modeled upon, was identical or nearly identical to the British East India flag.
@399: “. . . corporations are not (small-d) democratic, and historically they are rarely respectful of human or individual rights . . .” Regrettably, this is true. But something has changed, something we are hardly conscious of.
The phenomena is technically known as ‘ever increasing economies of scale’. We have long known that economies of scale favor larger enterprises. The machine shop large enough to afford a CNC machine tool can produce more at lower cost than a machine shop relying on a machinist laboring at each machine tool.
The computer age has brought this phenomena to massive scale. Amazon, for example, is replacing the mom-&-pop shop, the chain store, the city shopping district, the mall.
We all cry for Congress to rein-in these enterprises of enormous scale. And, Congress is all too eager to oblige. Congressmen will divide up between the “good Congressmen” and “bad Congressmen” factions. The good Congressmen will promise the large enterprises to keep the bad Congressmen from destroying their business models. Moreover, the good Congressmen will submit regulations – ostensibly to control the big guys – to make it impossible for small organizations to enter the business model. (If a computer jock can’t compete with unregulated Google, imagine how much more difficult it would be to compete with Google regulated by impossible burdens to cater to the good Congressmen’s plan to preserve Google’s monopoly.)
And, we will all buy into this. Look, we are eagerly buying Alexa to enable the Masters of the Universe listen in as we argue with our spouses or make love with our significant others. Why? Because we prefer to command Alexa to turn our lights on/off rather than flip a switch. We are selling ourselves into slavery – eagerly.
A nice essay Mark, and I would agree with most of it. The one thing I’m a bit suspicious of is the “economy of scale” argument. Not that I totally dismiss it — it is obviously a factor, illustrated by most of the examples you gave — but I think as arguments go it is often used to mask massive government subsidization of large corporations (i.e., purchased political influence) as opposed to the genuine competition faced by smaller corporations/companies that can’t afford to buy the same level of influence.
Coincidentally a few minutes ago I was having a discussion with a former workmate, who only recently retired. He was telling me how massively the corporation we used to work for is staffing up — mainly with new kids — for a government contract they don’t have yet; but based on past history, it’s very likely the fix is in. There were similar examples in my time, as much as 35 years ago, when I knew that the corporation was serving as an artifice to boost the economy of the entire region, at a time I was working on a program when I did nothing at all for about a year-and-a-half, until I couldn’t stand it anymore. At that time they had teams of new kids working on solving problems that had already been solved, years before; a commercial software package could have been purchased with one kid’s salary for the month. “Efficiency” in any sense of the word was not a consideration.
Part of “scale” is, sufficient scale to purchase political advantage. Mom and Pop are not going to have cities and states competing with tax advantages to move their machine shop there. Amazon will have that advantage. Can you think of a reason my former employer might curry favor by “creating jobs” in the next (election) year, and their management be rewarded for it?
I just wish that someday cities will recognize the economy of scale of offering *every* business tax breaks and loosened regulation, rather than offering such things on a case-by-case basis to the biggest players.
Alas, but such a solution doesn’t provide sufficient opportunities for graft….