We can amend the Second Amendment to clarify the meaning of “A well-regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.”
Make the first clause primary and the second clause contingent (SCOtUS has reversed that – the second clause is primary and the first is incidental. It’s throw-away language, if you will. Make the first clause primary, and then everyone has the right to join the militia (the National Guard). Privately held arms can certainly be controlled then.
Yes, this is the most popular Russian bot meme on social media now. The elaborate conspiracy theories would be hilarious if they weren’t so cruel and ignorant. Liberals are coaching kids, you know. They have no minds of their own. An outtake showed a 16 year old boy, still traumatized, repeating phrases to himself just before appearing on air, and this has become the “proof” that they’re all just faking it.
A lot of RWNJs are taking up the craziness. We have become a nation of Alex Joneses.
When I was 16 I was pretty much a hippie, extremely political, participated in anti-war marches and avoid-the-draft movements. I had a daily diary where I recorded though (and I’m still impressed with how adult I sounded back then). High school kids are passionate. They can be a force for good. I believe them and the activism of these protesters gives me hope.
That can be done without even amending the Constitution. Simply take back the SCOTUS and overturn Heller and the other ruling (which name escapes me at the moment), then go back to how the SCOTUS has been interpreting the 2nd Amendment for 200+ years.
Then can be controlled now. Scalia rather clearly laid that out in the Heller case. But the resistance always revolves around a completely unbounded view of the 2nd Amendment (which, not ironically, is driven even more by the Heller decision) that any attempt at gun control is unconstitutional.
So, screw it. Let’s go all in and just repeal the antique. Republicans, funny enough, are already half way their themselves…they have essentially repealed the first clause entirely. People can still own guns, but the arguments for gun ownership regulations take a serious hit going forward.
Very idealistic, but I totally agree. The gun fondlers and their moneybags lobbyists have clung to this fiction for almost 20 years, pretending that gun ownership is somehow patriotic because of the 2nd amendment. The NRA can rely on this falsehood to boost gun sales, and the ruse has been extraordinarily successful. So I wish we could burst this bubble and face the reality that there are no more militias except for the crazed Bundy-like cultists hiding out int heir clubhouses, reminding each other how manly they are.
But after seeing how the ERA was defeated (whaaaat? Women equal to men?) I can see that changing the Constitution is a long uphill battle, especially in today’s poisonous climate.
With lifetime appointments on SCotUS it would be quicker to amend the Constitution.
There is talk (idle chatter, I believe) of pushing to impeach Clarence “Long Dong Justice” Thomas, but I don’t think it will happen. We’d need 67 votes to impeach in the Senate and I just don’t see that happening. Impeachment of Roberts or Alito or Gorsuch is an even longer shot with less grounds.
Here’s the list of names of the Florida politicians who refused even to discuss banning assault weapons, complete with telephone numbers and email addresses!
Perhaps it is time to start a boycott of Florida. No more travel to Florida until it addresses the endless violence caused by its permissive laws regarding access to guns. Boycotts have worked well in the past. I plan to write to the baseball teams that currently hold spring training in Florida and urge them to move to another state that is more concerned with the safety and welfare of its citizens .Both the NCAA and the NFl moved events because of policies that it believed were antithetical to our democracy. This issue deserves the same treatment.
Repealing the 2nd Amendment is the long game. There are many shorter gains, more easily achieved. The 2nd amendment allows gun ownership as long as owner is part of a ‘well regulated militia’. This restriction is meaningless today, due to Supreme Court rulings in the recent past. IOW the kid who shot up the HS in Florida was a lone wolf, not part of any militia. Simply getting back to the spirit of the 2nd Amendment would be an improvement over the free-for-all we have today.
That’s exactly it. They are beholden to the NRA, the gun manufacturers lobby.
It’s the same reason Trump doesn’t impose sanctions on Russia, Russia owns him.
I see your point, but any Constitutional change has a huge barrier to surmount. Even if it miraculously passed 2/3 of Congress, it then would have to pass 3/4 (or 38) states. I would argue piecemeal gun control legislation (eg., universal background checks, assault weapon age restrictions, then AW bans) would be more plausible- but almost as difficult.
BTW, WaPo has a decent video comparing Obama vs Trump responses to school shootings
If it was just Florida, that would be one thing. But it isn’t just Florida. Much of Chicago’s gun problem is caused by Indiana’s lax gun laws. Virginia has very lax laws, too. In fact jurisdictions with reasonably strict gun laws are the exception rather than the rule. I don’t see pulling Florida back from the bleeding edge of crazy to merely stupid as being worth the effort.
Scott …pledged to increase spending on school safety programs and on mental health treatment.
For the rest of his term, he’ll be cutting budget items he doesn’t like “to free up money for school safety and mental health treatment,” which will see token spending on minor initiatives.
On the contrary, by federal law he is part of the “unorganized militia”:
10 U.S. Code § 246 - Militia: composition and classes
(a) The militia of the United States consists of all able-bodied males at least 17 years of age and, except as provided in section 313 of title 32, under 45 years of age who are, or who have made a declaration of intention to become, citizens of the United States and of female citizens of the United States who are members of the National Guard.
(b) The classes of the militia are—
(1) the organized militia, which consists of the National Guard and the Naval Militia; and
(2) the unorganized militia, which consists of the members of the militia who are not members of the National Guard or the Naval Militia.
All males between the ages of 17 and 45 are members of the militia. How “well-regulated” the unorganized militia is is another issue.
This is even one of the dictionary definitions of “militia”:
militia noun
all able-bodied males considered by law eligible for military service.
Student Demonstrators outside of the 1968 Democratic Convention in Chicago, while being beaten, gassed and run into by a Police Paddy Wagon by Mayor Richard Daly’s Riot Police. Appropriately named Riot Police, because they initiated what became a riot at what had been a peaceful demonstration. They also assassinated Fred Hampton the very next year.
I’d just add that it would absolutely unprecedented–the forced-birther crowd’s been doing it for decades, including on the sides of large truck/trailer displays.
True, Strad, though it may be worth the threat, at least. As with other efforts, it needn’t be perfect to be worthwhile and could certainly send a message.
