"The Liberals' Lament"

The minute the Supremes rule the other way, he'll change his tune. And while I believe the individual rights interpretation of the 2nd Amendment is correct (along with a strict scrutiny test for limits to the right) I'm much less sure that our 9 black robed masters will find this to be the case. It matters not that their logic will be false, their interpretation corrupt and their history selective - it will be "the ruling."

It should be noted that many of us liberals who think we're edging towards fascism and/or a police state do not think Bush is Hiterlian in any way. The Hitler rhetoric is thrown about on both sides of the aisle quite a bit, and that's regrettable for many reasons. But fascism can exist quite well without genocide.

That being said, I'm not sure why gun rights and gun control are conservative/liberal issues, it makes no sense to me at all. I don't think it has anything to do with whatever socio-economic groups you think liberals come from, but rather philosophical reasons. All the liberals I argue with about gun rights always seem to focus on How They Want The World To Be, not How The World Really Is.

I dunno. But yeah, if liberals think we're sliding towards fascism, then they better learn how to frickin' shoot instead of wallowing in hoplophobia.

P.S. What I meant to say was that they are always talking about "if there were no guns" or "if guns were not available."

Well, there are guns, and guns will always be available, so they might as well be talking about how amazing this country would be if we all rode unicorns to work.

Read that article earlier and only had one quibble: The Bill of Rights didn't grant rights, it recognized them as naturally existing.

But coming from someone who apparently believes that power flows from, rather than to, the Government it's understandable.

The reason is a simple one, they've confused you with labels they've applied to themselves which don't properly describe themselves. In almost every case where you hear/read the term liberal, at least in the US, you could substitute the term progressive. Now, this is not always true, but many a time it is. And I know I'm ripping the following off from someone else, but I'm not sure who(maybe Tom Kratman? Although he probably ripped it off of someone else) Now, imagine the type of person who would call themselves progressive. Imagine the very conceit it would take to brand yourself as progress embodied in human flesh. It quickly becomes apparent why gun control is an important issue to these people. After all, we can't have people who have the ability to seriously defend themselves from our progressive reforms, that would defeat the purpose. This is why the politicos do so. The remainder primarily follow the gun control mantra because guns are scary.

I think it's only liberal vs conservative as a second order of consequence.

To my thinking, the first order of consequence is individualist vs collectivist.

The individualist recognizes arms for what they are: power. He also considers arguments for disempowering oneself to be insane.

The collectivist, on the other hand, considers the individualist to be inherently insane and untrustworthy, the last sort of person he'd want to actually have any power.

While your individualists tend to scatter across all points of the political spectrum, your collectivists tend to congregate, as is their nature.

The more articles we see like this from so-called mainstream legal pundits, the more likely 1) the Supremes will grant certiorari, and 2) they will rule in favor of an individual right. The Supremes read the papers, you see, and (Kelo notwithstanding) they generally do not want to issue a decision that a majority of pundits and citizens do not support.

That being said, I would not be overly concerned if the Court denied certiorari. With Parker/Heller being the state of the law in the D.C. Circuit, presuming standing can be established (concedely not a dog fall in a non-criminal gun control case) every federal gun control law has the potential of being challenged in D.C. district court. I would still prefer to see certiorari and granted and an individual right upheld by the Supremes.

The reason people believe that Democrats all support gun control is their leaders all support gun control. When was the last time a Republican tried to get a gun control bill passed?

Turley's "Liberal Lament" was a warning to Liberals to stay clear of gun control.

You hit the nail on the head, Jordan. Liberals are all about control they cant have who knows how many millions of gun owners opposing their crackpot liberal social schemes. Liberals that say they want to "bring us together" mean rounding us all up in a detention center.

The following is long and convoluted. I wrote it trying to explain why the terms of liberal and conservative are so confusing in our society. I hope it is not too convoluted to be understood. There are two terms each for domestic "liberalism" and "conservatism", and two terms of opposite meaning for each when talking of other nations. Here goes:

First we must understand that liberal and conservative labels are applied to two separate levels of discussion. What is societally liberal and provides for the most individual liberty is in actuality political conservatism.

What is "classic liberalism" is political conservatism, meaning that the consitution is conservatively interpreted to mean what it says. Thereby lending itself to the utmost attainable individual liberty which is by definition "classic liberalism".

A liberal interpretation of the constitution is, in fact, social conservatism, which is in and of itself diametrically opposed to political conservatism. Political liberalism (societal conservatism) is the antithesis of individual liberty (American political conservatism). Societal conservatism (political liberalism) is best left to your religious or ethical leaders who may suggest what they believe to be proper comportment of the citizen but cannot make it compulsory.

These labels have exactly the opposite meaning in America than in any other country in the world. The reason for this is simple. In every other country in the world the power resides in government, so that any loosening of government strictures against the citizen is considered a liberal development. In our country, the power according to our Constitution resides in the people so that any loosening of government strictures is considered a conservative development in that it reaffirms the meanings and intentions of the constitution, thereby increasing and/or ensuring individual liberty.

The confusion then is that here we have two definitions of liberalism and two definition of conservatism, depending upon whether one is speaking of societal/political liberalism or conservatism. Add that confusion to the fact that each of them have opposite meanings in the rest of the world and you have a verbal double switchback. Due to ignorance and lack of education in the majority of people that is one to two turns too many for them to realize when they are being bamboozled.

Take notes, we are soon approaching a test.

Why is gun control a liberal issue?

Think back to relatively recent history.

John F Kennedy
Martin Luther King Jr
Robert F Kennedy

How many of your heros would you watch die, before you would take up the cause of banning the weapon that killed them.

It was an emotional response to an emotional issue. I don't think you'll find gun control was on the national liberal agenda before this.

Conservatives (today) are inclined to trust their fellow citizens, and to not trust the State, while Liberals (again, today) are inclined to trust the State, and not their fellow citizens.

I have to give credit to Turley, whom I usually disagree with, for coming out and making such a public statement in support of the individual-rights view.

Very refreshing to see a liberal academic (but I repeat myself) actually come out and have the honesty and integrity to recognize what is obvious to anyone who is not being disingenuous and blinded by the liberal agenda. A pretty good piece of commentary, not in the least because he reaches the right conclusion.

Democrats have always been big gun banners. In the South, Georgia in particular, the Democrats used gun control to disarm the blacks to make the white supremeist jobs safer. These laws still exist in GA.