Category: Civil Liberties

… keep the hippy vote. Remember kids, the Democrats are the party of choice.

Dave Hardy offers some detail on a challenge to the McCain-Feingold Campaign Finance Act that’s heading before the Supreme Court.   Given that O’Conner was the swing vote the last time this came up, maybe the Supreme Court will be in the mood to overturn, or at least vastly weaken this law that never should have happened.  Both NRA and the ACLU have submitted briefs in favor of the plaintiff (and against the Government’s position in favor of the campaign finance reform law).  CNN also has some further analysis that quotes from NRA’s brief:

“Overturning these well-established laws would turn our elections into free-for-alls with massive corporate and union spending,” said David Arkush of Public Citizen, “and would make officeholders beholden to the deep pockets that promote them.”

On the other side are groups like the ACLU and the National Rifle Association, now best buddies in their call for nonprofit corporations to speak out.

“For like-minded individuals lacking great wealth, pooling their donations to fund a political message is, in a real sense, the only way for them to find meaningful voice in the marketplace of ideas,” the NRA said in a brief to the high court. “There is nothing pernicious, problematic or distorting about individuals banding together in this fashion to express shared political values and make themselves heard.”

Unfortunately George Soros and Michael Bloomberg are also joining NRA’s position, but ultimately I think this law is an unconstitutional restriction on free speech, so Soros and Bloomberg just happen to be on the right side of this debate.  I’ll gladly join them on this one.  If you want to read the actual briefs, I’ll steal the link from Hardy for here.

UPDATE: Given that this case was heard back in March arguing on narrow grounds, and that the Supreme Court has asked that it be re-briefed and reheard on broader grounds, we may soon see the Supreme Court overturn its own precedent, and nullify a large part of the McCain-Feingold Act.   This would certainly be welcome.

The White House seems to be trying to recruit NEA grant recipients in the arts to act as his propaganda arm.  What if Bush had done this?  I guess we can look forward to more wonderful art reminiscent of Soviet propaganda.

Looks like the FBI is worried about “lone offenders.”

The effort, known as the “Lone Wolf Initiative,” was started shortly after President Obama‘s inauguration, in part because of a rising level of hate speech and surging gun sales.

“Finding those who might plan and act alone, the so-called lone offenders … will only be prevented by good intelligence, the seamless exchange of information among law enforcement at every level, and vigilant citizens reporting suspicious activity,” said Michael Heimbach, the FBI‘s assistant director for counterterrorism.

Because rising hate speech and surging gun sales always go hand in hand, don’t they?

Hate groups have multiplied across the USA, from 602 in 2000 to 926 in 2008, reports the Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks extremist groups and works to limit their activities. Mark Potok, director of the center’s Intelligence Project, said the lone attacker is an extension of the “leaderless resistance” concept of activism advocated by white supremacist Louis Beam.

Yes, here we go.  The SPLC report.  No doubt in this tough economy the SPLC is having difficulty raising money just like every other non-profit, and what raises money better with left wing donors than a good scare story about bubbas with guns playing army?  As SayUncle points out, it never went away.  It just fits within their narrative again.

I understand the FBI and Secret Service have a job to do, and as I’ve said in the past, I hope they do their job well when it comes to protecting the President.  But that ought not to extend to spying and profiling of American citizens, just because they hold the “wrong” opinions.  The type of threat the FBI proposes to defend against would only be possible with a pervasive police state, and that should scare anybody.

In another overuse of SWAT team incident, in Milwaukee they use one to take down a squirrel shooter.  They wouldn’t comment on the type of gun used, but did find three dead squirrels in the yard as evidence.  My money is on the gun in question being an air gun, or you can bet the police would have mentioned it.  The people of Milwaukee can sleep safely tonight, or at least the squirrels can.

… when they pry my cold dead 90 year old hands from it.  I wish more people were like this.

The overuse of SWAT teams in the US is something that’s been well documented by bloggers like Radley Balko.  Well, over in the UK, they are called Armed Response Units, and it would appear recently that one was used to break up a 30th birthday party that police officials claim was a rave.  Well, it could have been a rave.  The guy invited his friends on Facebook, and at any minute that could have turned into a rave.  But I don’t see why you need an police with riot gear to break up a rave, even.  Aren’t most ravers typically too stoned out of their minds to put up much of a fight?

There’s been a lot of talk in the past about lines in the sand, and various challenges by various people for me to speak to where mine is.  Les Jones has an article about Obama’s Science Czar that would make the Russian variety appear to be a model of republican virtue.  Apparently, the man wrote a book on population control, where women could, according to Zombietime:

• Women could be forced to abort their pregnancies, whether they wanted to or not;
• The population at large could be sterilized by infertility drugs intentionally put into the nation’s drinking water or in food;
• Single mothers and teen mothers should have their babies seized from them against their will and given away to other couples to raise;
• People who “contribute to social deterioration” (i.e. undesirables) “can be required by law to exercise reproductive responsibility” — in other words, be compelled to have abortions or be sterilized.
• A transnational “Planetary Regime” should assume control of the global economy and also dictate the most intimate details of Americans’ lives — using an armed international police force.

You can see the book on Amazon here, althought it’s out of print.  If John Holdren got the society he wanted, it would be over my line.  What he’s describing is not a free society, it is a fascist state, and any American would be morally justified in resisting it, violently if need be.

I am not suggesting that this dystopic future is fast upon us — the guy is only a science czar — and I have enough faith in the system our founders created that I doubt a few fascist assholes buzzing around the White Houe is going turn FEMA camps into a reality.  But it does speak to Obama’s character and judgement, that he would admit a man like this into his Administration.  Even if he’s only a science czar, at least he should be called before Congress to explain himself for what he has written here.  Sadly, I hardly give that has any chance of happening.  The Democrats won’t want to risk making the White House look bad, and the Republicans aren’t going to want to admit they all voted to confirm this guy because they didn’t bother to have anyone check up on his CV.  The best we can do is spread this around, and hope it will have an impact on the 2010 and 2012 elections.

Knife Rights is reporting that an amendment has been introduced to stop the Customs enforcement of new regulations that would reclassify many types of common pocket knives as switchblades:

We now have a a bi-partisan amendment that has the critical support from the Senate committees which have responsibility for the FSA and which is endorsed by the Administration (Customs and Border Production have signed off on it). That gives it a very good chance of making it through the process, but first we have to get it voted into the Homeland Security Appropriations Bill.

They are asking people to write their senators and ask them to support it.  The amendment basically adds a specific exception to the Federal Switchblade Act for assisted opening folding knives.