“Scandals” or Diversions?

It is common knowledge by now that fully ONE-THIRD of the Radical Right-controlled House committees are investigating the Obama administration.  The most important question to be raised currently is not: what did the Obama administration know and when did they know it?  The most important fundamental question to be asked is:  to what end? For what purpose are these hearings being held? 

I have heard it said that the answer to that question lies in the oversight function of the Congress.  According to Wikipedia:

“Although the Constitution grants no formal, express authority to oversee or investigate the executive or program administration, oversight is implied in Congress’s array of enumerated powers. Reinforcing these powers is Congress’s broad authority “to make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution the foregoing powers, and all other powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States, or in any Department or Officer thereof.
“The authority to oversee derives from these constitutional powers. Congress could not carry them out reasonably or responsibly without knowing what the executive is doing; and whether officials are obeying the law and complying with legislative intent. The Supreme Court has legitimated Congress’s investigative power, subject to constitutional safeguards for civil liberties.
“The ‘necessary and proper’ clause of the Constitution also allows Congress to enact laws that mandate oversight by its committees, grant relevant authority to itself and its support agencies, and impose specific obligations on the executive to report to or consult with Congress, and even seek its approval for specific actions.  Inspectors general (IGs), for instance, report their findings about waste, fraud, and abuse, and their recommendations for corrective action, periodically to the agency head and Congress.”

Unfortunately, Congress takes advantage of this inherited power to play a political game of ‘cat & mouse.’  They are all too willing to use their “oversight power” to stir-up political issues and to harm politicians of the opposite party, than they are to find ways to solve or resolve problems.  Worst of all, they often fail to bring legislation forward to deal with problems, bureaucratic flaws and inefficiencies, or to change the procedures of government that sometimes get in the way of effective legislation and execution on behalf of the citizenry.

A perfect example of this exists right now in the three so-called “scandals” that have been brought to the attention of the public.  Although the Right can’t seem to find evidence of wrongdoing on the part of the White House, they rely on their usual tactics of innuendo, conspiracy theories, and character assassination to achieve their purposes which we shall enumerate later.  Fact-based rhetoric is not their strong suit!

1)    The Benghazi attack.  Radical Republicans would have us believe that the important things to know about this attack upon our embassy in Libya are:
--Why was it not referred to as a “terrorist attack“?
--Why did the administration use Susan Rice to put forward the story that an amateur video was to blame for the attack and not al Qaeda?
--Who gave her the talking points?  How were they fashioned?

--Why did the State Department refuse to use the military to aid the embassy while they were being attacked?  Who gave the order to stand down?
--Why didn’t the State Department. respond to a memo of need for embassy protection before this attack occurred?
--Did the Secretary of State have a part in this neglect?
--Why didn’t the President use the full might of our armed forces, in Libya (and Syria), to bring these people down and to help the rebels?

We could, of course, go on and on, as there are many more, mostly political questions, being raised by the radical right-wing ideologues.  In light of the many emails provided to the Committees, many of the questions have been answered.  Once again, the key to dealing with this issue is not to raise political “whodunit” questions so one can simply fix blame.  The issue for a legislative body must always be: what are the problems here and how can we fix them?  OR:  what can we do legislatively to solve the policy, procedural and budgetary problems that are at the heart of this incident?  So, some of the questions might be:

• What are the laws, rules, strategies, procedures, etc. that are supposed to apply to these types of situations?
• Do any of those laws and procedures need to be modified, repealed, amended, enhanced to help prevent this sort of thing from happening again?
• What are the underlying problems at our embassies that make our people vulnerable to attack? 
• What additional monies are needed?
• What is our current protocol about notifying State about inadequate protection?  Is that sufficient, or do we need a better protocol?
• What should our Mission be in other Mid-eastern countries that present such dangers to our embassies and personnel?
• What should our strategy be toward rebel groups in such countries?  Do we need a different strategy toward each country, rather than one-size-fits-all?
• What can Congress do, what can the Executive Branch do, what can State do to strengthen our presence in these middle-eastern countries, or do we need to find safer locations for our embassies and personnel?

These are fundamentally different questions than those being raised in Congressional hearings where blame, fault, missteps, political posturing, and political gamesmanship hold sway.  I predict that little will come from these “hearings” by all of these committees in the way of new resources, new strategies, new goals, effective new legislation or in terms of new spending to improve the dangerous situation for our overseas diplomats.  Because if you aren’t asking the right kinds of questions, you cannot get the right answers to fit the situation.

In contrast to these so-called ‘hearings’, a 2012 Government Accountability Office report by an independent review panel said serious lapses in management and leadership left the Libyan consulate badly unprepared.  Despite those deficiencies, the board determined that no individual officials ignored or violated their duties and recommended no disciplinary action.  Moreover, the panel called for a greater commitment from Congress to support the State Department's needs.  The Senate on Feb. 4, 2013  did approve legislation to allow the State Department to transfer $1.1 billion in surplus funds, no longer needed in Iraq, to improve security at U.S. embassies overseas in the aftermath of the deadly assault on the U.S. Consulate in Libya last September.  The bipartisan measure gave the department the authority to expedite construction of Marine security guard posts at overseas facilities, and to build secure embassies. 

The GAO report suggested that embassy security remains vulnerable so long as the State Department maintains missions in dangerous locations amid staffing shortages. President Obama’s new budget includes $4 billion to improve security at America’s more than 270 diplomatic posts worldwide. That includes a $2.2 billion boost–proposed by the Accountability Review Board–in State’s embassy security construction budget to fund new facilities in high-threat areas, but Congress has yet to approve the funding. (Michael Crowley report, May 08, 2013). 

Just as they did in 2011 and 2012, will the radical Republicans vote against an increase in funding for our embassies and their security?  Highly likely.

2)   The Associated Press.   Attorney General, Eric Holder, is once again being harassed by Darrel Issa’s Committee that Issa uses as his personal forum for attacking the Obama administration.  This so-called “scandal” is that the Department of Justice allegedly over-reached its bounds, and confiscated the personal phone numbers of certain Associated Press reporters in an attempt to find a leaker who let out certain classified information that could have endangered the lives of soldiers, diplomats, and covert agents. 

According to Michael Isikoff, National Investigative Correspondent, NBC News:
“The Justice Department used a secret subpoena to obtain two months of phone records for Associated Press reporters and editors without notifying the news organization, a senior department official tells NBC News, saying the step was necessary to avoid "a substantial threat to the integrity" of an ongoing leak investigation”,  apparently in pursuit of the source of a leak about an al Qaeda bomb plot in Yemen.

The seizure of the phone records, is the latest move in a series of high profile and controversial investigations by the Justice Department of leaks of classified information. In a letter of protest to Attorney General Eric Holder,  AP President and CEO Gary Pruitt said obtaining more than two months of AP phone records on 20 separate telephone lines without prior notice was a "massive and unprecedented intrusion" into news-gathering operations.

However, Bill Miller, spokesman for Ronald C. Machen, Jr., the U.S. attorney in Washington, D.C.,  said in an email that the subpoena for the records was done by the book.  "Consistent with DOJ regulations, the department provided notification to the Associated Press of the receipt of toll records in a letter dated May 10, 2013." He noted that Justice regulations "do not require notification to the media prior to the issuance of legal process to obtain toll records."

In a separate email, Miller wrote: "Those regulations require us to make every reasonable effort to obtain information through alternative means before even considering a subpoena for the phone records of a member of the media. We must notify the media organization in advance unless doing so would pose a substantial threat to the integrity of the investigation.”

We have here the possible conflict of a witch-hunt with a more reasoned approach to a fundamental matter in our democratic society: when is a subpoena necessary for records of  a sensitive nature?  And what are the bounds within which such a subpoena should operate?  Since the promulgation of the Patriot Act under the George W. Bush administration, there have been questions about intrusion into the rights and lives of many of our citizens.  That Law must now come under greater scrutiny to determine if it has over-stepped some important boundaries that speak to the freedoms we all enjoy.  The Congress needs to examine all other Acts that allow the government to somehow “get around” the Fourth Amendment.  Have we crossed over too many boundaries in our efforts to combat terrorist activity?

After all, the Constitution in Amendment IV has some very important things to say about searches and seizures:  “The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.”

This is less of a “scandal” and more of a wake-up call to determine if we have misguided policies and procedures in place, even though the proper procedure was followed and nothing “illegal” occurred.  The questions that must be raised have less to do with who did what to whom, and who authorized it, than they do with how do we decide what is necessary for maintaining national security while protecting our constitutional rights?

Perhaps Congress needs to pay more attention to passage of a Media Shield law, especially those Republicans who have opposed or demurred about such legislation.

3)    The IRS scandal.  By now, this story seems to be the clearest of all, and the one of most concern to ordinary citizens.  USAToday sums it up:

“Washington's latest political scandal involves a little-known unit of the Internal Revenue Service that determines which groups don't have to pay taxes. Staff in that unit had singled out conservative political groups for greater scrutiny of their applications for tax-exempt status, an IRS official said last week.” 

The IRS says it subjected Tea Party-affiliated groups to additional scrutiny based solely on the name and stated goals of the organization. Often, those groups were asked invasive questions about their donor lists, affiliations and contacts with the media — questions not routinely asked of other groups.

This was prompted by the number of applications for tax-exempt social welfare organizations doubling from 2010 to 2012, to 3,400 a year. According to the IRS, that's largely because of a surge in politically oriented groups before the 2012 presidential election and in the wake of favorable court rulings. In response, an IRS unit in Cincinnati began to sort politically oriented groups into a separate "bucket" of applications. IRS Exempt Organizations Director Lois Lerner said this was done for consistency.

The normal process for seeking tax-exempt status involves an organization filing an application and answering a 36-item questionnaire on its structure, purpose and activities. Based on those answers, the IRS may seek additional information.

Lerner said about 300 groups went into a "bucket" of applications getting more scrutiny. About a quarter of them were groups that had "Tea Party" or "Patriot" in their names, she said. The others may have drawn scrutiny based on broader criteria that pulled out groups whose issues involved government spending or debt, or whose goals were critical of the government, according to a timeline provided to members of Congress.”

President Obama has called these actions outrageous and unacceptable,  and now those who did not conduct proper oversight and management are losing their jobs.  This is appropriate.  What is not appropriate is for Radical Republicans to imply and aver that the Obama White House directed that such activity take place.  The evidence for such accusations is just not there. 

What is evident, at least to me, is:

• The new head of the IRS has not been confirmed by the Senate, and so a Deputy Director, a career civil servant, was running the agency, and he was preceded by a Bush appointee 
• The 501(c) (3), (4), (5), (6) sections of the IRS code need in-depth scrutiny by the Congress and the White House.  These classifications leave much to be desired, and the restrictions regarding political activity are not clear nor do they have any “bite”
• There are not enough staff at IRS to handle the number of applications for 501 status
• IRS staff may not be adequately trained in their responsibilities
• Laws need to be changed to correct abuses, ensure training, protect the public; perhaps Congress should give serious consideration to the Disclose Act which they have not done heretofore.

In all these incidents, the Congress is failing in its responsibility to lead by legislating.  It is failing in its oversight responsibility to examine judiciously the underlying problems in a bipartisan manner.  It is failing in it’s responsibility for staffing and budgetary support of Executive Branch offices and departments.  It has failed to provide confirmation of major staff appointments leaving Executive agencies hampered by lack of leadership and plagued by lack of direction.  Career appointees as agency leaders have little incentive to carry out the best intentions of the current administration.  Finally, Congress has failed to give the President the authority to consolidate and re-order the departments and offices of the Executive Branch. 

At least a large part of the failure of certain agencies of the Executive Branch to do their jobs well can be traced to the intractability of the Congress on approving appointments and on providing monetary support for adequate staffing.  But the wicked obsession of too many members of both houses to see this President fail is a major problem.  So here, at long last, are some of what I consider to be the purposes behind all of these hearings:

1)    To delay action on, and consideration of, President Obama’s main policy agenda.  The Right Wing wishes to avoid any further dealings with real issues like gun violence, women’s issues, immigration, jobs, infrastructure, the climate, and dependency on fossil fuels because their rhetoric and lack of solutions has not played well on the national stage.

2)    This is a continuation of the right-wing strategy of  damaging the public’s view of national government.  They want the public to believe that government is out to get them, that government is intervening in their lives (ObamaCare their prime example), that government is responsible for all the ills of society, that government cannot be trusted, that government is their enemy and may have to be overthrown by armed insurrection. 

3)    This is a blatant attempt to discredit President Obama.  Not able to carry out Mitch McConnell’s all-consuming dictum to prevent this President from winning re-election, the Radical Right has turned to trying to destroy his legacy.  And that leads us to:

4)    The continuing attempt to “tar & feather” our first black President.  These so-called “scandals” are one more way to keep race covertly at the forefront and to attempt to convince as many as possible that you can’t trust this President or his administration (symbolized by the shameful attacks on his African-American Attorney General and UN Ambassador).  It is evident in the all-out attempts to connect everything negative to the White House, including the use of a Marine to hold an umbrella over his head, and more particularly, the charge that the President is not interested, is lazy, is incompetent or unable to manage the bureaucracy.

5)    The IRS scandal is ready-made for the Radical Right to use as another pretext for its on-going attempts to “flatten” tax rates, or to “simplify” the tax code.  Guess who the flat tax would most benefit?  The richest 1%, of course.

6)    And finally, it is the desperate attempt of the Right-wing to deflect the public’s distrust of their policies and philosophy illustrated in the Romney campaign, the Ryan Budget, the Sequester, the attack on women, and their campaign of obstruction against any legislation or program that would help the middle class and the working poor. 

The Republican Right-wing is once again the villain in it’s own production.  It is time to throw the bums out before they destroy both the Legislative and the Executive branches of our government.

Gun Violence Prevention Legislation Still Alive; LaPierre Wants to Kill It All

According to information obtained from www.senate.gov and the Library of Congress at www.thomas.loc.gov, we have certain gun violence prevention legislation currently pending in both the Senate and the House.  First, there is Senator Feinstein’s bill, originally introduced on 1/24/2013, known as S.150 and titled “Assault Weapons Ban of 2013.”  As of March 14th, that bill was placed on the Senate Legislative Calendar under General Orders.  The Calendar is composed of several sections, which identify bills and resolutions awaiting Senate floor actions. Most measures are placed on the calendar under the heading "General Orders" in the sequence in which they were added to the calendar; in this case #27 on the Calendar, placed there on March 14, 2013 by the Chair of the Committee on the Judiciary, Sen. Patrick Leahy.  (Related Bills: H.R.437, S.691 King-Thompson (HR-1565).

A related bill, S.691, entitled “High-Capacity Ammunition Magazine Ban of 2013,” was introduced in April by Sen. Frank Lautenberg of New Jersey, and is also on the Calendar at #36.  This bill has no immediate summary attached. 

The Summary of Sen. Feinstein’s bill reads, in part, as follows:

Amends the federal criminal code to ban the import, sale, manufacture, transfer, or possession of a semiautomatic assault weapon, including:

• a semiautomatic rifle that can accept a detachable magazine with certain characteristics;
• a semiautomatic rifle or pistol with a fixed magazine that can accept more than 10 rounds;
• a semiautomatic pistol that can accept a detachable magazine and has certain defined characteristics;
• a semiautomatic shotgun that has certain characteristics, such as a folding, telescoping, or detachable stock; 
• a shotgun with a revolving cylinder;
• firearms that are specifically listed as prohibited by this Act and copies, duplicates, variants, or altered facsimiles with the capability of any such weapon;
• all belt-fed semiautomatic firearms;
• any combination of parts from which any such prohibited firearm can be assembled; and the frame or receiver of a prohibited rifle or shotgun.

However, it excludes from such ban any semiautomatic assault weapon that: (1) is lawfully possessed on the date of enactment; (2) is manually operated; (3) has been rendered permanently inoperable; (4) is an antique firearm; or (5) is used for law enforcement or security purposes or for testing or experimentation authorized by the Attorney General.
Identifies, by make and model, firearms that are specifically exempted from the ban imposed by this Act.
 
Requires the Attorney General to establish and maintain a record of the make, model, and date of manufacture of any semiautomatic assault weapon which the Attorney General is made aware has been used in relation to a crime under federal or state law.

Makes it unlawful to: (1) import, sell, manufacture, transfer, or possess a large capacity ammunition feeding device (can accept more than 10 rounds of ammunition); or (2) store or keep any grandfathered semiautomatic weapon that may become accessible by an individual who is prohibited from receiving or possessing such a weapon. Requires identification markings (i.e., serial number and the date of manufacture) on semiautomatic assault weapons and large capacity ammunition feeding devices. Provides for the seizure and forfeiture of prohibited large capacity ammunition feeding devices.

(Sec. 5) Makes it unlawful for an unlicensed individual to transfer a grandfathered semiautomatic weapon to another unlicensed individual, unless a licensed importer, manufacturer, or dealer: (1) has first taken custody of the weapon for the purpose of complying with existing national instant criminal background check requirements; and (2) upon taking custody, complies with all firearms requirements as if the licensee were transferring the weapon from the licensee's inventory to the unlicensed transferee. Sets forth an exception for the temporary transfer of possession in a licensed target facility, but prohibits such regulations from imposing recordkeeping requirements on any unlicensed transferor or from requiring licensees to facilitate such transfers.

(Sec. 6) Amends the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968 to allow the use of Edward Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance Grant Program funds to pay compensation to individuals who surrender semiautomatic assault weapons and large capacity ammunition feeding devices under a buy-back program.

(Sec. 7) Requires: (1) the Attorney General to instruct the Director of the National Institutes of Justice to conduct a peer-reviewed factual study of incidents of mass shootings in the United States, and (2) the Director to report the findings of such study to Congress within one year. Requires the Director to examine the impact upon perpetrators of specified factors, including childhood abuse or neglect, exposure to criminal acts or bullying, mental illness, school supportiveness, the availability of firearms and of weapons information, depictions of violence in video games and the media, and poverty or other socioeconomic factors.

In the House of Representatives, we find the following:

H.R.138
Latest Title: Large Capacity Ammunition Feeding Device Act
Sponsor: Rep McCarthy, Carolyn [NY-4] (introduced 1/3/2013) Cosponsors (87)
Related Bills: S.33, S.691
Latest Major Action: 1/25/2013 Referred to House subcommittee. Status: Referred to the Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, Homeland Security, And Investigations.
SUMMARY AS OF:
1/3/2013--Introduced.
Large Capacity Ammunition Feeding Device Act - Amends the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act to prohibit: (1) the transfer or possession of a large capacity ammunition feeding device, except for such a device lawfully possessed within the United States on or before the date of this Act's enactment; and (2) the importation or bringing into the United States of such a device.
Exempts: (1) the transfer or possession of such a device by a federal, state, or local agency or law enforcement officer; (2) certain transfers to licensees under the Atomic Energy Act of 1954; (3) possession of such a device transferred to an individual upon retirement from a law enforcement agency if such individual is not otherwise prohibited from receiving ammunition; and (4) the manufacture, transfer, or possession of such a device by a licensed manufacturer or importer for authorized testing or experimentation purposes.
Sets penalties for violations.
Requires a large capacity ammunition feeding device manufactured after this Act's enactment to be identified by a serial number that clearly shows that the device was manufactured after such enactment.

H.R.437
Latest Title: Assault Weapons Ban of 2013
Sponsor: Rep McCarthy, Carolyn [NY-4] (introduced 1/29/2013) Cosponsors (75)
Related Bills: S.150, S.691
Latest Major Action: 2/28/2013 Referred to House subcommittee. Status: Referred to the Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, Homeland Security, And Investigations.  It has not yet been assigned to the House Legislative Calendar.

SUMMARY AS OF:
1/29/2013--Introduced.
Assault Weapons Ban of 2013 - Amends the federal criminal code to ban the import, sale, manufacture, transfer, or possession of a semiautomatic assault weapon, and is similar in content to Sen. Feinstein’s bill, S.150.

H.R.1565 - This bi-partisan bill seems to have the support of Mayors Against Illegal Guns and has already garnered 159 Co-sponsors including Democrat Rep. Thompson whose name appears as Co-sponsor.
Latest Title: Public Safety and Second Amendment Rights Protection Act of 2013
Official Title as Introduced:  To protect Second Amendment rights, ensure that all individuals who should be prohibited from buying a firearm are listed in the National Instant Criminal Background Check System, and provide a responsible and consistent background check process.
Sponsor: Rep King, Peter T. [NY-2] (introduced 4/15/2013) Cosponsors (159)
Latest Major Action: 4/30/2013 Referred to House subcommittee. Status: Referred to the Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, Homeland Security, and Investigations.

So there you have it on the legislative front where there is currently little activity of substance, but a promise of things to come.  Harry Reid is a sticking point.  He does not like dealing with this type of legislation, being from a state where the second amendment holds great sway.  On the other hand, he is the Majority Leader in the Senate and basically he calls the shots on legislation and the Calendar.  So, Harry -- how about we get Senator Feinstein’s legislation to the floor where an up-or-down vote can be taken? But don’t make any deals this time on special rules for 60-count majority votes on all amendments. 

What else is transpiring?  Well, Executive Vice-President of the NRA, Wayne LaPierre, has no qualms about his stance (and that of the NRA) on this legislation.  During a speech to that group’s annual convention, he made his loyalties crystal-clear, declaring that "we will never surrender our guns" and further declaring that the ill-fated background check proposal in Senate was ineffective.

Here are some excerpts from CNN and NBC News, plus the Washington Post:

He implored members to step up their outreach to members of Congress as part of a fight against "elites" and others who "use tragedy to try to blame us, to shame us" into compromise and who "want to change America, our culture and our values."
LaPierre said NRA membership has spiked, reaching a record 5 million, and he implored members to counter efforts by leading gun-control advocates, like New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, Obama, and Democrats in Congress.

"We are in the midst of a once-in-a-generation fight for everything we care about. We have a chance to secure our freedom for a generation, or to lose it forever," LaPierre said.
"We must remain vigilant, ever resolute, and steadfastly growing and preparing for the even more critical battles that loom before us," he said.

LaPierre disparaged what he called Obama's "all-out siege against our rights" and efforts in Congress to enact new gun control measures, calling it "political posturing."
"Mr. President, you can give all the speeches you want. You can conjure up all the polls and you can call NRA members all the nasty names you can think of, but your gun control legislation won't stop one criminal, wouldn't make anyone safer anywhere," LaPierre said.

LaPierre and the NRA propose, instead, that current laws be enforced, that schools include armed guards, that the government rebuild a "broken mental health system," and "for God's sake, leave the rest of us alone!"

LaPierre said the failed compromise background check proposal by Senators Joe Manchin, a West Virginia Democrat, and Pat Toomey, a Pennsylvania Republican, were ineffective.
"The Manchin-Toomey bill you later backed wouldn't have prevented Newtown, wouldn't have prevented Tucson or Aurora," he said of other deadly mass shootings in Arizona in 2011 and Colorado last July, "and won't prevent the next tragedy,"
"None of it, any of it have anything to do with keeping our children safe at school anywhere," he said.

LaPierre also referenced the Boston Marathon bombings and subsequent manhunt as an argument for putting guns in the hands of more Americans.  He was, of course referring to the way Bostonians were, as he put it, "frightened citizens... sheltered in place with no means to defend themselves."

“How many Bostonians wished they had a gun two weeks ago?” LaPierre said. “Boston proves it. When brave law enforcement officers did their jobs in that city so courageously, good guys with guns stopped terrorists with guns.”

Thus, we stand where we stood before: within a House divided.  On the one hand are the protector’s of a right granted by the Constitution and interpreted by the Supreme Court to apply to individual gun owners.  On the other hand, are those who say that every Constitutional right is subject to certain restrictions on abuses of those rights that could abrogate the right or the Constitution itself.  The essence of the argument boils down to what one believes about protection, freedom, and responsibility.

Self-defense and self-protection are certainly important to our well-being, but when they crossover into the anarchy of shooting other people without cause other than a perceived threat, then we have a problem of enormous proportions because we have moved from rule of law to rule of guns.

Freedom is tricky, and it trips us up every so often.  Freedom is not libertinism where one can do as one pleases, and everyone else be damned.  Freedom is not simply an individual right; it is an individual potential within the complicated context of community life.  That is, my freedom is related to your freedom and to everyone else’s freedom.  Society cannot sustain itself with a bunch of individualists going their own way.  Society - the commonweal, the public domain -  is a group of individuals brought together within a framework of laws that allow basic freedoms to all individuals but within the context of the well-being of the society and the restraints that communal living place upon us all.  Therefore, my life, liberty and pursuit of happiness are all wide open to me, but they are at the same time restrained by my obligation to others and my responsibility to live as a good neighbor with my fellow citizens. 

The problem with freedom of gun ownership advocated by the NRA is precisely the fact that the NRA has convinced many gun owners that they have an unbridled right to those guns, to use them as they see fit.  Aside from a few educational programs about gun safety and responsible use of said weapons, they do not see any possibility or reason why society should put any restrictions on gun usage whatsoever.  That is the epitome of social irresponsibility.  It bespeaks a hostility to the society that is unthinkable in this contractual government.  It says that my individual right to gun ownership and use is above your right to a potential for a life free from the threat of being killed by an irresponsible, crazed or criminal gun wielder.

In fact, the mantra that having more and more gun owners and users would prevent abhorrent behavior by killing or disabling gun wielders before they can do the same to me is again the vision of an old wild west where the gun was the law and whoever shot first was the victor or the star or the top gun, and the survivor. 

Gun ownership is not just a right or a freedom, it is a responsibility, and carries with it an obligation to defend all of our liberties and freedoms, including the rights, freedoms and well-being of all citizens and of our government.

The right-wing nuts who currently hold sway in the NRA (and the Congress) are not defenders of liberty; they are the destroyers of liberty because they cannot, and will not, attune their will to the will of the people.  The lesson of the rejection of the Manchin-Toomey amendment on background checks is not that people don’t want them, but that a small crowd of NRA lobbyists and officers cowed the people’s representatives into voting against the rights and freedoms of this society to defend and enhance its own communal life and liberty.  They did not attack just gun restrictions; they attacked the citizenry as a whole; they attacked the nature of our Commonweal and came away with a loss that they call a victory.  We as a representative democracy are the worse for their success.  We have lost the ability to restrict an individual right even when that right results in behaviors clearly shown to have harmed society and the citizenry as a whole. 

The argument that such restrictions as limited ammunition clips, background checks and a ban on military-style assault weapons would not have stopped the perpetrators of  Columbine or Tucson or Aurora or Newtown or other such massacres, is not the point.  What we need to do is change the mind-set, the viewpoint, the norms that people now accept so readily: that gun violence is the price we must pay for the right to gun ownership; that gun violence cannot at least be diminished by wise and prudent and sensible laws, without diminishing the right of  responsible citizens to bear arms.  We are being told by the NRA and their co-conspirators that responsible gun violence prevention legislation and laws are not the prerogative of the people or in their interest.  Such bamboozling talk is anti-community and anti-democracy, for we are being sold the false rule of guns and their owners, rather than the sovereign rule of law. 

The NRA has too much profit motive for us to ever believe their rhetoric.  They are now speaking, not for their members, but for the gun manufacturers who want to sell as many guns as they can to as many people as possible, so they can increase their profit margin.  Every time Wayne LaPierre opens his mouth to speak, we should hear his words of gun industry CEOs and Board Presidents flowing forth to produce greater sales.  The protective barrier constructed by the NRA to keep the second amendment sacrosanct is nothing more than the protective cover of a lobbying group seeking corporate payments and acquired clout.  Don’t be bamboozled by Wayne LaPierre, or any of his ilk.

NRA’s Answer for Our Times: ARMED INSURRECTION

We begin this week’s Blog with some words from hitnewsnow.blogspot.com:

“The NRA's leadership embraces an insurrectionist ideology that asserts that the intent of the second amendment is to permit American citizens to shoot and kill federal agents and law enforcement officers in the event that they believe those agents are attempting to facilitate or impose some form of government tyranny.  This dangerous doctrine, that flirts with committing treason, is the cornerstone of the gun lobby's opposition to any and all forms of gun control, and is explicitly expressed by many of the NRA's congressional supporters."

Testifying before the Senate Judiciary Committee, the NRA's Wayne LaPierre argued that, "without any doubt" Americans need the firepower to fight back against the government if government agents come knocking at the door. LaPierre (has also) stated bluntly that “Our Founding Fathers understood that the guys with the guns make the rules.”

The most frightening part about this insurrectionist ideology is that the people who adhere to it, already believe we are living under tyranny or headed rapidly in that direction.  With this in mind, many of them already contend that the time for armed insurrection is now or at least it is coming very soon.  In March of 2012, a Republican Committee county chair in Virginia published a newsletter that… argued that America under Obama was so tyrannical that if he could not be voted out in November, armed insurrection would become necessary.”

I find this loose talk of revolutionary action to overthrow the government ludicrous in the extreme.  First, this is a small minority of the population.  Second, they are talking about a government that has already been taken over by the rich and powerful who will not hesitate to crush them in a moment’s time.  Third, they need the support of the population for a revolution to be successful.  Where do they expect that vast support to come from?  They have forgotten that there are millions who will rebel against any such armed insurrection led by wrong-headed individuals who see conspiracy, socialism, and privacy invasion wherever they look, and who will lead us to worse government, not better government.

They are a small minority:  The Southern Poverty Law Center counted 1,007 active hate groups in the United States in 2012. Only organizations and their chapters known to be active during 2012 were included.  And that only counts hate groups.  How many of those hate enough to attempt an overthrow of the government?
Surprisingly enough, a new poll by Fairleigh Dickinson University indicates that 44% of Republicans and 29% of Americans believe that an armed rebellion might soon be necessary to protect our freedom and rights.  The percent of Democratic Party members who agree drops to 18% but the percent of Independents who agree is up at 27% (this was a poll of 863 registered voters conducted nationally by telephone with both landline and cell phones from April 22 through April 28, 2013, and has a margin of error of +/-3.4 percentage points.)

One commentator, a Justin Acuff of addicting info.org, writes:
“Unsurprisingly, those numbers are much higher among conservatives and those without much education.  This goes to show that the sensationalistic endorsement of fringe conspiracy theories that are driven forward in the name of freedom and small government by the conservative right are starting to take hold… and the Republican side of things has proven itself to be quite effective of making use of fear as a motivator, especially through their propaganda wing, Fox News.”

But before we get too upset about the fact that almost a third of our people think armed rebellion may be necessary, we have to ask how many of these are left of center revolutionaries who will be glad to overthrow the revolutionaries from the right?  Hard to say.  The point is, no one can be sure what this poll signifies except what Acuff suggests: that Fox News is having an effect on the thinking of certain people. 
What one must always keep in mind if contemplating an armed rebellion against government is what Justin also points out: it’s best to have the support of a near-unanimous  percentage of the people or the chances of succeeding are not great.

Another commentator on armed rebellion has this to say about such support:
“I think the Government Stinks too...but most people are too self -involved to even care about what is going on in the country they live in.......I mean most people were more concerned with the Death of Heath Ledger than the fact that almost 4000 soldiers have died in a useless war (on CNN.com ).....It truly is sad....I mean more people vote for American Idol in a state on Wednesday night then in a primary or caucus .....people have better things to do I guess ......no time for a revolt”

In that same vein, I find the utterances about armed rebellion from right-wing revolutionaries to be, in the main, comical and tragic; the opposite sides of the same coin.  They just don’t get it: the people are not on their side.  Even 44% of Republicans is misleading  when you consider that a heavy percentage of those are probably senior citizens, some of whom have never owned guns, may not understand what an “armed rebellion” entails, and have little capacity to support or join such an actual attack upon their sitting government.  Their main concern may become:  Who will send out the social security checks while we‘re shutting down the government?  Armed rebellion rhetoric is just another ploy by dissatisfied conservatives to frighten a larger percentage of Americans into believing the unbelievable.

A government that has already been taken over:  Our present government is under the control of the richest 1-2% of this country.  More than 40% of our current Congress are themselves millionaires and are representing constituencies other than their own back home because they are financially supported by fellow-millionaires and billionaires who donate to their campaigns.  They are also supported by special interests to whom they cow-tow when it comes to their votes.
Take the recent example of 45 senators who voted against expanded background checks on those purchasing guns.  Although a huge percentage of people in this country, in poll after poll, favored such legislation, this bi-partisan amendment was defeated because a certain group led by the NRA threatened to withdraw their support in the next primary election for anyone who voted in favor.  Enough caved in so that a 60-vote result was not attained, although a simple majority was actually acquired.  So this is the government against which you want to rebel.  First of all, they just voted with you and against their own constituents and second, if they don’t want to be overthrown by you they will stop you with their power and their money if you ever try an armed rebellion against them.
More broadly:  what “government” are you talking about?  Your answer to this question is not well-defined; agents do not a government make.  After all, blaming troubles on government is not new.  We all need a scapegoat at times, and this is a perennial one.  What is this amorphous something called “government” that is completely interfering with our everyday existence and messing with our lives? Just what are we talking about?
Is this “government” the Congress that makes all of our federal laws and appropriates all federal monies?  Is this “government” the one administered by an Executive branch of offices and departments that carries out those laws and those appropriations?  Or, is it the “government” of a Judicial system that judges the constitutionality of the laws, decides on guilt or innocence of alleged individual and corporate law-breakers, and metes out punishments according to its verdicts?

Actual armed rebellion against the federal government is another thing entirely  when one looks at reality!
“Government” is legislators, teachers, first responders (police, fire, emergency personnel), clerks and secretaries, administrators and supervisors, scientists and border guards, and of course it‘s agents who carry out the laws in person; it’s judges and attorneys and some doctors, and millions in the military forces.  Government, above all, is people.  It is not amorphous.  It is people doing jobs that make government work, every day.  There is not some inner circle planning to takeover anything.  They don’t have time for such nonsense. 
Oh sure, people in government get carried away sometimes.  They propose things that are unconstitutional, they do things without careful consideration, they mess-up badly when they propose something that has exceptional but unintended outcomes, they do sometimes use power, and taxpayer money, poorly.  Government is people -- they make mistakes. 
But, there are many more people who are also part of our particular form of “government“; they are called citizens or “we, the people”.  They are the ones who have the responsibility of being one of those checks on what other members of government sometimes do poorly.  They must organize, they must speak out, they must vote, they must work for change when it is needed, and yes, they must take action by non-violent protest and citizen action in an attempt to reverse mistakes made by the governing bodies.  This branch of “government” -- the people -- is not to be ignored.  It can itself rise up and rebel against any right-wing armed rebellion; and probably would.
Destroying our “government” by armed rebellion is not acceptable.  It is in itself, the destroyer of democracy because no vote to foment rebellion will ever be taken, and therefore cannot become a law of the land.  In other words, armed rebellion is an illegitimate action that does not preserve our representative democracy; it is, in and of itself, the end of democracy because it is rule by a few; it is dictatorship.  No armed rebellion (except ironically, the American revolution), can claim to promote democracy, for the armed group that carries out rebellion is rarely, if ever, intent upon returning power to the people. 
The American Revolution is somewhat different in that it was established upon the core principal of representative democracy (“no taxation without representation” was one slogan).  It intended, and expressed in document(s), including numerous petitions to the Crown, that it wished to establish a representative and open government instead of the closed monarchial system.  And amazingly, the armed rebellion carried out that intention.
But armed rebellion against our current democracy has little chance of producing more democracy, especially if the rebels are themselves seeking power to carry out their own agenda and not that of the vast majority of the citizens.  One armed rebellion, called the Civil War, failed in its goal of destroying the federal government because it neglected the will of the people.  The Confederacy did not prevail partly because, in contrast to the Revolution, their underlying motive was to maintain slavery and thus to diminish the people, not to enhance their suffrage or their democratic ideals and liberties.  It failed because it intended to weaken democracy not strengthen it.

Where do you expect your support to come from?  Gun owners?  People who hate other than white folks?  Urban gangs?  The Tea Party?  Can you actually muster the armed help of more than 1-5% of the population?  It is very hard to say.  But let us be clear about one thing:  you do not have broad-based support.  You never will. 
In truth, there are, in this country, those who are vehemently opposed to your talk of armed rebellion against the government.  If our national government, as a result of your rebellion, was to become a radical right-wing, national socialist, hatred-filled cabal that destroys freedom and takes away the civil rights so long fought for and won, YOU would be surprised and overwhelmed by the reaction waiting for you from people not known to favor unbridled ownership of guns.  Although it will make for some strange bedfellows, they will join the 1% plutocrats now in charge to oppose your rebellion and to annihilate your movement.  Your mantra that everyone should own a gun in order to protect themselves shall surely come back to haunt you.  Beware your own rhetoric for you shall surely reap what you have sown!
Although our colonial government was built on the foundation of armed rebellion against a government, we are wedded to representative democracy as the best form of government ever constructed.  To date, we have not heard from your side as how you would improve upon that model.
Maybe that is your greatest failure.  You have not said how you will govern.  In fact, that is the major difficulty with most rebellions, revolutions and civil wars.  The opposition rarely thinks ahead and plans for the transition from status quo to a new form of governance.  And so, chaos and anarchy are most likely to reign until, inevitably, a form of dictatorship emerges, which is much easier to manage than a messy democracy.  And there lies the rub.

For all your talk about government interference, government injustices, government bureaucracy, government over-spending, government destruction of freedoms, we can’t tell for sure if your form of government, yet to be announced, would correct any of the problems that have arisen in our form of government.  So, unless you are anarchists, whatever you propose to substitute for the brand of government we have now, will probably increase all of our current problems and spawn many more, instead of reducing them and producing a more democratic, free, people-centered structure.

I have said it before, and I’ll say it again:  government is not the enemy.  It is sometimes the target of our frustration and even our anger, but it is not the enemy.  Government is much broader than we generally proclaim for it, because it includes the citizenry as one very important branch or component.  We are endowed with unalienable rights, we are also the source of voter power; we are mentioned in the Constitution as possessing unspecified powers not reserved to the federal government or to the states.  We are part of the government and it is our responsibility to see that it operates as it should.  We are protected in our speech and our religious practices,  we have the right to a redress of grievances, search and seizure is not permitted on an arbitrary basis and privacy and property are even protected. 

The real enemy consists of those forces that want to diminish the power of the people, and the rights and privileges that we enjoy.  The enemy are those who want to capture the levers of government through under-handed, illegal, and even legal means (through donating obscene amounts of cash to campaigns).  The enemy are those who seek power over others; who want others to conform to their ideologies, their religion, their way of life; their values.  The enemy are those who want to restrict voting rights and the social contract that we have for the well-being of all our citizens, particularly of our most vulnerable. 

The enemy is not the government.  It may need reforming; it may need non-violent and organized opposition; it may need reproving; it may need picketing; it may need lots of forms of redress of grievances, but it is not the enemy.  It does too much that is right to replace it with what is wrong.  It performs too many services that protect and enhance people‘s lives, to be replaced by entities that cannot adequately address the peoples’  needs. We cannot simply overthrow that which exists and expect that flaws and inadequacies will be addressed.  Our form of governance demands that we be ever vigilant and ever-active in seeing that our government functions as it was designed to function, but to change it peacefully when we are aggrieved by its performance.  Insurrectionist talk, philosophy and ideology will not enhance our system for it is intrinsically contrary to a democratic system of government.  It’s past time to tell the NRA leadership to change their ridiculous tune.