It looks like the Senate of the People’s Republic of Coastal California is shredding the Constitution again:
Spurred by mass shootings in Connecticut, Colorado and Arizona, the California Senate on Wednesday approved seven bills to tighten regulations on guns and ammunition.
The measures would:
• Prohibit magazines that hold more than 10 rounds of ammunition;
• Require background checks for all buyers and sellers of ammunition;
• Reclassify certain shotguns as assault weapons;
• Require all gun buyers to take a firearm-safety certificate class;
• Expand crimes that would result in a 10-year ban on owning or buying firearms. Additions include drug- and alcohol-related offenses, hazing, violations of protective orders and court-ordered mental health treatment.
The legislation cleared the Democratic-controlled chamber on party-line votes. All Republicans voted against the measures; four Democrats voted against the ammunition background checks.
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Several months ago, rogue former LAPD cop Christopher Dorner went on a murder spree, killing innocent people and ambushed cops during his mayhem. Bizarrely, he still attracted a shockingly significant number of supporters. I read numerous comments on Twitter of those who felt his actions at least somewhat justified by the allegedly rampant corruption of the LAPD. For a time, he was a folk anti-hero.
Now, imagine if an individual similar or superior to Dorner in training (which wasn’t great, but he understood police tactics and procedures and apparently had some military small arms courses) had a more obviously righteous cause, such as the preservation of the Constitutional rights of Americans.
Suppose—and this is an intellectual exercise, not a call to arms—such an individual targeted legislators and other government officials creating such tyranny, was careful to avoid collateral damage, and published a manifesto of justification that drew unflinchingly from the Constitution and Bill of Rights, explained the Right of Revolution, and otherwise built a congent, intelligent, emotionally-relevant explanation for his actions?
What sort of support do you think he would find among the population at large, a population that already feels Sacramento is a cesspool of corruption running roughshod over individual liberties? I suspect such an individual would still be well outside of the mainstream, but that such an individual allegedly acting on behalf of the people would still draw far more support that an ex-cop angry about the way he was treated as an individual. After all, Dorner acted as an individual and people who felt oppressed by the LAPD still chose to live vicariously through him.
An individual echoing the words of the Founders themselves on behalf of all the people might possibly inspire active support. If some of those supporters begin to mirror his actions, we’re facing a potential Unintended Consequences and Katie-bar-the-door, because there is no guarantee that such a revolt would stop at the state line.
Frankly, that is the sort of violent response that should have happened in Germany in the 1930s as Nazism came to power, but the German people were far more occupied with the thought of doing what was legal, instead of doing what was right.
What’s going on in California is the sort of naked political power grab that inspired men to form units for the protection of their communities, and drew them out on an April morning long ago to confront those who would deny them their rights. Of course, the oppression isn’t confined to California, as regular readers well know.
As various corrupt statist governments keep pushing at an current accelerated pace to deny citizens their individual liberties, they push us all closer to a tipping point. Obviously, they think they can redefine America by pushing “legal” remedies to the “problem” of freedom.
The question, of course, is whether comfortable Americans still have the sand to stand against such naked tyranny. It’s time for citizens to think long and hard about the differences between what is “legal” according to those making today’s laws, and what is right, moral and constitutional that our Founders shed their blood and tears to create.
I don’t expect you to answer me here, but I ask for you to look in your hearts, and decide where you will stand when tyranny approaches.