Category: Progressive Derangement

Somewhere this morning I was reading an article — oh, come to think of it, it was at Breitbart — where a commenter posited that it was time to junk the Constitution and try something new, though said commenter didn’t seem to know what that should be.  He did mention “Confederacy”, which means he’s likely a fucking idiot who doesn’t know we already tried one of those and found it severely lacking (the first one, under the Articles of Confederation, not the second one the South attempted to pull, though it was seriously lacking as well).  Oh, got it!  It was this article at Breitbart — “PA Lt. Gov. Fetterman: ‘You Do Not Have the Right’ to Spread Lies That Are ‘Yelling Fire in a Crowded Theater’”.  He’s wrong, but we’ll get to that.  And here’s the comment that set me off:

The fact is, we don’t need to junk the Constitution (or the Union).  We need to start applying the Constitution to the existing unConstitutional superstructure that’s been built onto the original framework, and junk all the crap that’s accreted over two centuries onto the Framers’ grand design.

The easy example is gun control, and I bring it up first, because “the Second protects the First”.  BATFE is unConstitutional.  The National Firearms Act of 1934 (granddaddy of all current gun control) is likewise unConstitutional.  The plain reading of the Second Amendment is:  “My God-given right to own and carry guns in defense of myself, my family, and my country, shall not be infringed by the federal goverment period, end of subject.”  Note the following (from way back in the depths of history, 1993):

And read that last bit about the Preamble to the Bill of Rights.  The Bill of Rights is not a list of things we get to do because the government says so.  The Bill of Rights is a list of things the government is constrained from doing because we the people say so.  It places restrictions on the government because the men who wrote it had suffered under, and revolted from, a government that had no such restrictions.  And there were a bunch of states that ratified the Constitution only upon exacting a promise that just such a Bill of Rights would be added to it.

The Bill of Rights contains things that shouldn’t have to be said, but they’re being said anyway because smart people over 200 years ago knew the government itself, and its myriad functionaries, could not be trusted with the car keys.

So let’s get to this moron in Pennsylvania, who has actually been elected to the second-highest public office in that state, who thinks the First Amendment does not permit one from expressing what he thinks are prevarications and treasons.  The fact is, his opinion in and of itself is a prevarication and a treason, and should be grounds for his immediate removal from office.  But Pennsylvania (and other states) haven’t been particularly good stewards of the First Amendment for a while:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Simple, eh?  Doesn’t say a damn thing about yelling “Fire!” in a crowded theatre, and Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., was pretty much wrong when he wrote, in the Schenk case in 1919:

The most stringent protection of free speech would not protect a man falsely shouting fire in a theatre and causing a panic. […] The question in every case is whether the words used are used in such circumstances and are of such a nature as to create a clear and present danger that they will bring about the substantive evils that Congress has a right to prevent.

— Schenck v. United States, 249 U.S. 47

The problem is, this decision was later partially overturned in 1969 (Brandenburg v. Ohio) which stated

[T]he constitutional guarantees of free speech and free press do not permit a State to forbid or proscribe advocacy of the use of force or of law violation except where such advocacy is directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action and is likely to incite or produce such action.

— Brandenburg v. Ohio, 395 U.S. at 447-48

And the moron in PA might be right if there weren’t evidence galore pointing to the election having been stolen, particularly in his own state.  But the onus is on him to prove that making these statements was intended to provoke, say, a riot in the U.S. Capitol.  There’s pretty clear evidence debunking charges that President Trump told people to go invade the Capitol.  So maybe this moron needs to read the right-wing press once in a while, for clarity.

The bottom line is, the moron is just trying to shut people up under color of law, and as noted previously, he needs immediately to be removed from office.  So does his boss, who my brother-in-law says he went to school with and remembers him as a great guy.  I guess my BiL likes being told what to do by the State.  I don’t.  But I live in Indiana where our statist RINO governor is being ignored left and right, so long as you’re not in Indianapolis/Marion County.

(Maybe there is something to be said about folks who don’t live in Indianapolis saying Indianapolis is what’s wrong with the state.)

But again, you can’t revoke First Amendment privileges, and you can’t simply write laws that infringe upon it.  Freedom of speech is a fundamental natural right of man, just like freedom of self-defence, freedom to be secure in your home from the government commandeering it to quarter troops, freedom from unreasonable search and seizure, and freedom from being forced to self-incriminate.  And that’s just the start.

The point of this exercise is to point out that it’s not the Constitution or the Bill of Rights that are at fault.  It’s the people who claim to be “interpreting” them who are at fault.  And the people who are just ignoring the hell out of what it says, too.  Like Old Lady Pelosi impeaching President Trump again, days before he leaves office, on the basis of a claim that’s been shown to be specious, both by a careful examination of what he said, and by a careful examination of the timeline of events that has the Capitol riot starting either before he started to talk, or while he was still talking.

Making a crime out of speech that is not in fact criminal is pretty gutsy, even for commies, folks.

But this is why whenever someone tries the worn-out claim that the Constitution has failed us, I just assume that person is either

• A commie
• A moron
• Both of the above
• A sitting politician or government employee who realizes the government has overstepped and is living in fear of the proles figuring it out
• or all of the above

We do not need something to replace the Constitution.  If we would simply go back to following the plain language of the Constitution, we would be a lot better off — and we’d be rid of most of the albatross we’ve allowed to be hung around our collective neck (the permanent bureaucracy).

Oh.  And get rid of the 16th, 17th, and 25th Amendments while we’re at it.  (I used to say just 16 and 17, but it’s clear what use the 25th is being perverted into by the Democrats, so it has to go, too.)

To all my peeps who are saying Nancy Poo-losi is trying to do something unconstitutional (I mean, like what else would be new): Before making fools of yourselves, please look carefully at Section 4 of the 25th Amendment.

Whenever the Vice President and a majority of either the principal officers of the executive departments or of such other body as Congress may by law provide, transmit to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives their written declaration that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, the Vice President shall immediately assume the powers and duties of the office as Acting President.

She’s hanging her fortunes on that highlighted bit.  And she’s entirely within her rights to do so.

Of course, it has to pass the House — which may not be a given, because it’s so blatant even a lot of the House Dems may not go for it.  Then, she has to get it past the Senate…and either get the President to sign it, or both Houses have to override his veto. As if that’s going to happen.  And even if it passes, they’d have to get the Vice President to agree with them — and Pence is not going to sucker-punch his boss.  That’s not how Race Bannon operates.

So we can all take comfort — sort of:  Because it’s not really about Trump. It’s about preparing the ground to get rid of Biden if the country actually rears up and elects a senile old child molester, so Kamala-lala can be president instead, and the civil war that’s heating up can really get started.  (Did someone say, “Boog?”)

Wheels within wheels, folks. It’s how the Democrats operate. Just like the Communists.  Because that’s what they are.

Just don’t expect the Supreme Court to come riding to our rescue.  Because they’ll take one look, shrug, and say, “why should we grant cert to a case opposing something that’s clearly allowed by the Constitution, even if it’s never been acted on in the past?”  And they’ll be right.  Damn it.

Someone tried to make this point over on Fecesbook, on a friend’s post:

Footnote: If [the Left] truly want a total separation of church and state, we have to end tax deductions for charity donations since this is a subsidy to the church. Next, since our basic laws are a direct reflection of our basic 10 Commandments, we need to entirely re-write our system of jurisprudence to express the morals (or lack thereof) in whatever new system the left seems to want.

I think this person may have been trying to act as advocatus diaboli, but whatever; let’s address the idiocy of requiring religious institutions to pay income tax and/or no longer be able to accept tax-exempt donations.  (With regard to the second half of his statement, nobody is going to rewrite the basic law because — in my opinion — it can’t be done at this late date, and frankly, without at least a nod to Deity, there is no basis for the basic law, since much of the law does in fact have a moral base — it is morally wrong to steal, to lie (perjury), cheat (defraud), commit adultery, and frankly to fornicate with animals and members of one’s own sex (although this last seems to have fallen by the wayside in our degenerate days.  Without a moral component, your argument that it should be illegal to steal falls apart, because “why?”  “Because I said so” is not sufficient; I don’t care what you think, but I do in fact care what G-d thinks, and they were His Commandments.)

So.  Read Jefferson’s letter to the Danbury Baptists some time. He mentions a “wall of separation”, but what he means by it isn’t what the left means by it. Jefferson’s wall of separation is set in place to prohibit the federal government from interfering with the religious beliefs and practices of ALL religions, denominations, and sects, and (though Jefferson doesn’t say so in so many words) from establishing a state church or religion.*

But the concept of a “wall of separation” exists nowhere in the Constitution or the Bill of Rights. It simply says that Congress cannot legislate the establishment of religion, or prohibit its free exercise.

The idea that a church should be established for non-profit purposes and therefore be tax-exempt grows out of the idea that the church (or whatever you call the congregation, depending on religion/denomination/sect) gives more back to the community than it would ever pay in taxes and that it is a force for good in society that should be supported, if only indirectly, by virtue of the government leaving it alone. It’s harder to see this in our day and age of welfare, Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and all the other social safety nets we erected starting in the 1930’s to take the place of social safety nets for which the religious community (including fraternal organizations and suchlike) was typically responsible before the Great Depression.

But never mind all that. The plain fact is, a simple reading of the First Amendment clearly states that Congress shall not legislate to prohibit the free exercise of religion. Forcing churches to pay corporate income tax on their donations and tithes and membership dues (and also ending the tax-deductible nature of such donations from individuals) would be such a prohibition, or at the very least would stifle the maintenance and growth of religion. On the other hand, this is why the IRS has such a high bar to cross in determining who is eligible for 501(c)(3) tax-exempt status. (I’ve applied successfully on behalf of a couple of organizations for 501(c)(4) status in the past, and that’s a pain, but it’s nothing compared to what you have to do to get and maintain 501(c)(3) status.)

And the left definitely wants to stifle traditional religion, so it bangs the drum for a supposed “wall of separation” that never existed other than in the fertile mind of Thomas Jefferson (who was NOT present at the Constitutional Convention, or at the convention where the Bill of Rights was written and adopted), who invented the term but clearly (at least in my read of his Letter to the Danbury Baptists) didn’t mean it the way the modern left has chosen to interpret it.

That being said, ALL institutions are suffering unduly under what I firmly believe are unconstitutional orders put in place ostensibly to prevent the spread of disease. It would make a great deal of sense if everyone could come together and point out that the government may not restrict the right to assemble in the first place, regardless whether such assembly occurs at a church, at a fraternal hall, in a school, in a restaurant, in a theatre, in a park, or on a beach, or in any other place where people normally congregate. The First Amendment was incorporated to apply to the states long ago, so all these state and local orders cannot be, prima facie, anything but unconstitutional.

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* Note that it did not prevent the states from continuing to promote state religion.  Maryland, for instance, was very Catholic, and if you weren’t a Catholic, typically you had a hard time getting ahead.  Other states had similar restrictive and preferential traditions tied to religion and benefits for those who hewed to the state’s preference, if not indeed laws on the books ditto.  Incorporation changed a lot of that, though the vestiges continue to hang on today in many places.

The difference between intelligent people and progressives is that intelligent people recognize institutions naturally will ebb and flow between center-left and center-right positions over time.  We see this constantly in the Executive and Legislative branches (except for the 40+ year period when the Democrats held Congress after WWII, which was to my mind an anomaly), but not so much in the Judiciary because so many federal judges have lifetime appointments.  So the Judiciary changes only gradually, one seat at a time if that, while Congress and the Executive oscillate wildly by comparison.

Progressives, by contrast, believe that every tilt to the left is (or should be) permanent, as a clear vindication of their slow march through the institutions.  This explains things like Reid’s nuclear option in blowing up the filibuster in 2013, and the general leftist conniption fit when the House flipped in 2010, and the Senate went back to the GOP in 2014 (both as a direct result of Congress forcing Obamacare on the public in 2010).  Of course progressives think they will never lose the House again after they won it two years ago on the back of lies, deceits, and vote fraud.  And their absolute snit over Trump’s appointment of a conservative to replace the liberal Ruth Bader Ginsburg on the Supreme Court is yet another example of progressive inability to see that, like the tides, political fortunes of the two parties ebb and flow, and have done throughout history.

This may also have something to do with progressive assurances that the seas will rise if we do nothing about climate change.  They simply cannot believe in anything that doesn’t fit their narrative.