Marco Rubio, Rick Scott, Mitch McConnell All Hot To Pass Red Flag Laws

By William Teach August 10, 2019 – 7:16 am

On the surface, red flag laws seem to make sense. Someone is making threats, acting in a crazy manner, and so forth, and a family member or LEO can make a petition which will have their firearms taken away for a period of time, and a judge must rule on this. Much like when a person is involuntarily committed. And we have

Marco Rubio: Red Flag Legislation ‘Makes All the Sense in the World’

U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., continues his push for the U.S. Senate to look at his “red flag” safety proposal, taking to the TV airwaves in Florida to showcase it.

In the aftermath of the mass shootings in El Paso and Dayton this past weekend, earlier this week, Rubio urged U.S. Senate Judiciary Chairman Lindsey Graham, R-SC, and U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., the top Democrat on the committee, to look at his “Extreme Risk Protection Order and Violence Prevention Act” in their next meeting.

Rubio first introduced this bill in March of 2018, following the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting in Parkland. That same year, Florida implemented its own red flag law, which has provided Florida law enforcement agencies with the ability to carry out more than a thousand risk protection orders.

Then to Rick Scott

I’m a gun owner and NRA member. I support red-flag laws.

In Florida, about three weeks after the Parkland shooting — and after the views of experts in mental health, education and law enforcement were taken into account — I signed the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Public Safety Act into law, surrounded by the families of those who tragically lost their lives.

Now, in the aftermath of the shootings in El Paso and Dayton, Washington should stop the partisan bickering and get to work on solutions. The steps we took in Florida, in addition to committing $400 million to increasing school safety, included a “red flag” provision. Properly constructed, the extreme risk protection order, as it’s known, is a common-sense public safety measure.

Anyone who has threatened self-harm, has threatened to harm others or is mentally unstable should not have access to a gun. At all. You can call it an infringement on rights if you want. I don’t care. Just get guns away from such people.

And

McConnell: Background checks, red flag laws will be ‘front and center’

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said Thursday that strengthening background checks and red flag laws will “lead the discussion” on addressing gun violence in the wake of two mass shootings that left at least 31 people dead.

McConnell’s remarks on a Kentucky news radio show follow a conversation he had Thursday morning with President Donald Trump, who has called for revisiting stricter background checks for gun buyers as well as red flag laws, which allows authorities to limit a person’s access to guns if they pose an imminent threat to others.

So, even Trump is thinking about them. Now, on the surface, they seem good. But, what if no one reports the person? The mother of the El Paso nutter (news of the Dayton nutter has rather dried up since he is a Democrat through and through) called the cops, but, did not identify herself or her son. What if they are abused? The system is ripe for people making false claims, leading to seizure of lawfully obtained property, with the person having to wait a long time before the property is returned, and, they don’t really work well

(Reason) Seventeen states and the District of Columbia have adopted such laws, most of them since the February 2018 massacre at a high school in Parkland, Florida. Although preventing mass shootings is the goal emphasized by advocates of red flag laws, data from Indiana and Connecticut, the first two states to enact them, show they are mainly used to protect people from their own suicidal impulses.

The evidence on whether they succeed in doing that is mixed, and so far there’s no firm evidence that red flag laws prevent homicide. One thing is clear: Taking away people’s guns based on predictions of what they might do with them raises thorny due process issues.

The Washington Post also notes the mixed results. And many have noted that they violate the 4th Amendment due process. The state cannot just come and take part of your land without a long hearings process, right? Now, if there was a guarantee that a court hearing would be held within 48 hours, it might be OK. A hearing in which someone did not have to lawyer up, costing them a lot of money. Really, the state should pay for a lawyer (a good one), since the State too away the accused’s property.

That’s the beginning of a long thread, worth the read.

The problem with red flag laws, like most of the Gun Grabbers agenda, is that they want them because it is a way to start taking away people’s guns. They slowly make them broader and broader. Chuck Schumer is warning McConnell that they best not be tepid.

If crafted correctly, they would be very specific, with little to no ability for executives and bureaucrats to rule make and expand. Here’s the law, here’s how it works, don’t go further, no mission creep. Period. If you want to change the law, it should require a 2/3rds majority to change it. Seriously, some people shouldn’t have firearms, just like some shouldn’t be allowed to drive. They’ve forfeited their Right through their own actions.

Now, though, consider, does a red flag law belong at the national level? On the surface it seems like something that states should do, right? But, the 2nd Amendment is a federal thing. Who better to implement than the U.S. Congress? And, get this: if one is passed, that is the law of the land. It would set the standard, and mean that states and municipalities cannot go further than the national red flag law. Liberals told us this when we were debating Arizona’s illegal alien law, SB1070, which was stronger than federal law. They all said that that was not allowed! So, trying to make any red flag law stronger than the federal one would nip that in the bud, putting gun grabbing states on notice that they cannot use red flag laws for backdoor confiscation gun grabbing.

Read: Marco Rubio, Rick Scott, Mitch McConnell All Hot To Pass Red Flag Laws »

Posted in 2nd Amendment, Current Affairs | 46 Comments | Trackback URL

Open Borders Advocates Upset Over Deported Iraqi Man Who Died

By William Teach August 9, 2019 – 2:19 pm

People commit crimes all the time and are forced to pay the penalty. Being in the U.S. unlawfully is also, get this, a crime, for which the basic penalty is deportation. It doesn’t matter how long you were here, you aren’t authorized. But, sure, we can have some compassion. The media and the Open Borders Advocates are freaking over this story, but, you have to read deep, well beyond where most have moved to a different story after being Outrage, to find something interesting

Iraqi man dies after Trump administration deports him

A 41-year-old Detroit man deported to Iraq in June died Tuesday, according to the American Civil Liberties Union and two people close to the man’s family.

The man, Jimmy Aldaoud, spent most of his life in the U.S., but was swept up in President Donald Trump’s intensified immigration enforcement efforts.

Edward Bajoka, an immigration attorney who described himself as close to Aldaoud’s family, wrote on Facebook that the death appeared to be linked to the man’s inability to obtain insulin in Baghdad to treat his diabetes. Aldaoud was an Iraqi national, but he was born in Greece and came to the U.S. as a young child, his family friend said. He had never lived in Iraq and did not speak Arabic, according to Bajoka.

“Rest In Peace Jimmy,” Bajoka wrote. “Your blood is on the hands of ICE and this administration.”

Huh. On Trump’s hands, not Obama’s?

The battle over the fate of Iraqis with final orders of removal began shortly after Trump took office.

The government of Iraq in 2017 agreed to accept deportees after previously refusing to cooperate with repatriations. Reuters reported at the time that the concession was part of an agreement to remove Iraq from the list of restricted countries in Trump’s original travel ban.

Said final deportation order occurred under Obama. Further, in almost the last paragraph

According to the ACLU and a POLITICO search of court records, Aldaoud had a criminal conviction for disorderly conduct and served 17 months for a home invasion.

If you’re in the country illegally, or even here under temporary refugee status or something similar, you get deported when you commit a crime which puts you in jail for 17 months. If someone was applying for citizenship and did this, they’d have that status revoked and ordered out. You feel bad for Bajoka, but, this was all on him. Not on ICE, not on Trump. There are penalties for breaking the law.

Read: Open Borders Advocates Upset Over Deported Iraqi Man Who Died »

Posted in Illegal Immigration | 2 Comments | Trackback URL

If All You See…

By William Teach August 9, 2019 – 1:00 pm

…is a horrible carbon pollution infused can of beer, you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is 90Ninety Miles From Tyranny, with a post on the Mystery Box.

Read: If All You See… »

Posted in If All You See | 3 Comments | Trackback URL

NY Times Suddenly In Favor Of Doxxing Campaign Contributors

By William Teach August 9, 2019 – 10:26 am

As long as they are Republican contributors, of course. Now, it’s not hard to find out who has donated to campaigns, especially the big contributors. You can get this information from Open Secrets, among others. It’s public record. But, to use that data to “shame” and harass is disturbing, and along comes to the NY Times Editorial Board

May the SoulCycle Boycott Make Democracy Better
Stunts like Joaquin Castro’s upstage a real concern: Americans should want to know more about who funds political campaigns.

That’s an interesting take in the subhead, since this same paper had exactly zero interest in knowing who was donating to Mr. Obama’s campaigns, especially when he had no safeguards to stop foreigners from donating through credit card. Nor are they interested in broadcasting how so many Democrats receive money from people who live in far away states.

It has been an unsettling week for some of President Trump’s political contributors.

On Tuesday, it was revealed that Stephen Ross, the billionaire real estate developer whose firm owns SoulCycle and Equinox gym, was hosting a big-money fund-raiser in support of Mr. Trump’s re-election campaign and the Republican National Committee on Friday, with ticket prices running as high as $250,000. This news did not sit well with many patrons of Equinox and SoulCycle, who took to social media to call for a boycott.

Lower down the donor ladder, 44 residents of San Antonio who had contributed the maximum legal amount to Mr. Trump’s re-election campaign found themselves in the spotlight, after their names were tweeted out on Monday by Representative Joaquin Castro, Democrat of Texas, who declared himself “Sad to see so many” of his constituents “fueling a campaign of hate that labels Hispanic immigrants as ‘invaders.’”

Unsettling? An elected politician, tasked with being a public servant, called for harassment of those contributors. Any violence that ensues will be on Castro’s head.

Public shaming seemed to be at the core of Mr. Castro’s tweet as well, though the outcry from Republican officials was much louder. The Texas congressman was accused of “inviting harassment” and “encouraging violence against” his own constituents. “People should not be personally targeted for their political views,” warned Representative Steve Scalise of Louisiana, noting that he knew “firsthand” that “lives are at stake.” (Mr. Scalise was shot by an apparently politically motivated gunman in 2017.) Donald Trump Jr. equated Mr. Castro’s tweet with the “hit list” kept by the perpetrator of Sunday’s mass shooting in Dayton, Ohio. There were calls for Mr. Castro to resign, and the hashtag #ImpeachJoaquinCastro trended on Twitter. (Note: Constitutionally speaking, impeaching House members is not a thing.)

But, in NY Times World

There is rich irony in Republican self-righteousness about public attacks on people’s political donations. Prominent Republicans routinely assert that the billionaire George Soros, a major donor to progressive candidates and causes, secretly controls the Democratic Party. Mr. Trump and his supporters spent over a year publicly smearing members of former special counsel Robert Mueller’s team as “13 angry Democrats,” based on their voter registrations or political giving, or both.

Perhaps the NY Times might investigate those links. They’re happy to rail against the Koch brothers. But, this is just an attempt to normalize the doxxing of political contributors for harassment.

As with all political tactics, there is also a high risk of escalation, to the point where each side routinely sics the dark furies of social media on their opponents’ donors.

Yet, the NYTEB is not castigating Castro for doing what he did.

And now this

https://twitter.com/OratioLiberum/status/1159540234780123137

Read: NY Times Suddenly In Favor Of Doxxing Campaign Contributors »

Posted in Journalistic Malpractice, Politics | 7 Comments | Trackback URL

Germany To Tax Sausage To Fight ‘Climate Change’ Or Something

By William Teach August 9, 2019 – 6:51 am

Want to get the German people to rise up, revolt, and put a stop to the climate change scam? This might be it. They had the yellow vests in France, would they be the pink vests in Germany?

Wurst Idea Ever? Germany to Tax Sausages to Fight Climate Change

German legislators have proposed raising the sales tax on meat from seven percent to 19 percent to fight climate change and improve animal welfare.

Research has shown that greenhouse gas emissions from livestock account for a higher percentage of total global emissions than the world’s 1.2 billion automobiles, a fact underscored by some German Greens who are pushing for higher meat taxes,

A United Nations report from 2012 found that the earth’s cattle population generates more carbon dioxide than automobiles, planes, and all other forms of transport combined. Moreover, the cow pies they deposit and the wind they break produce a third of the world’s methane emissions, considered 20 times more detrimental to the environment. (snip)

The idea of raising meat taxes would be to reduce livestock numbers — as well as their gaseous output — by discouraging people from eating meat.

Last June, Germany’s Green party vowed to ban industrial farming to reduce global warming if it ever were to come to power.

The measure was proposed by Katrin Goering-Eckardt, the party’s leader in the Germany parliament, as part of a massive €100 billion project to finance climate initiatives.

Or, they could just mind their own business and leave people alone. Because you don’t hear about these same elected representatives giving up their meat consumption, do you? And it is interesting that they love going to taxes, taking more money out of people’s pockets, eh?

Read: Germany To Tax Sausage To Fight ‘Climate Change’ Or Something »

Posted in AGW Idiocy, Global Warming | 5 Comments | Trackback URL

Elizabeth Warren Has A Plan To Take Over All Broadband For Your Own Good

By William Teach August 9, 2019 – 6:42 am

She’s apparently just given up on the incrementalism of Net Neutrality and gone straight to government ownership

What could possibly go wrong? From the link

Democratic presidential hopeful Elizabeth Warren unveiled a proposal to guarantee universal high-speed internet access on Wednesday as part of a new plan to invest in rural communities.

“I will make sure every home in America has a fiber broadband connection at a price families can afford,” the senator from Massachusetts wrote in a post on the blogging platform Medium. “That means publicly-owned and operated networks — and no giant [internet service providers] running away with taxpayer dollars.”

Warren said she would create a federal Office of Broadband Access to manage an $85 billion grant program. The grants would be awarded to electricity and telephone cooperatives, nonprofits, tribes and municipalities that pledge to bring high-speed internet to underserved areas. (snip)

Warren’s proposal cites low rates of internet access in rural communities.

About 1 in 4 people living in rural areas, and 1 in 3 living on tribal lands, did not have access to minimum speed broadband, the proposal says, citing an FCC report released earlier this year. And in urban areas, Warren wrote, many low-income residents cannot afford to connect to the internet despite technically having access.

“One of the best tools for unlocking economic opportunity and advances in health care, like telemedicine, is access to reliable, high-speed Internet. In the twenty-first century, every home should have access to this technology — but we’re not even close to that today,” Warren wrote.

If Net Neutrality is the heavy hand of government, this is like that hand wearing a lead gauntlet. A Megladon vs a great white shark.

People worry about the control that broadband providers have, and tech companies like Google and Facebook. How will it work with Government essentially owning and controlling access to the Internet? And what’s next? Taking over existing companies? Don’t scoff. Having a new Office Of Broadband would create mission creep, and, Warren yammered about broadband companies running away with taxpayer dollars, which seems to be her way of saying they are government dollars, rather than citizen’s money.

Read: Elizabeth Warren Has A Plan To Take Over All Broadband For Your Own Good »

Posted in Democrats, Web/Tech | 7 Comments | Trackback URL

Hot Take: AOC Accuses Democrats Of Voter Suppression When Her Candidate Loses

By William Teach August 8, 2019 – 4:25 pm

Poor loser

From the link

New York is as bad as the Deep South when it comes to voter disenfranchisement — and Democrats share the blame, according to Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.

In the wake of Tiffany Cabán’s concession in the Queens district attorney Democratic primary race, the freshman congresswoman is laying blame for her fellow progressive’s loss at the feet of state lawmakers and Gov. Cuomo.

“Voter disenfranchisement in the state of New York is a given,” she told the Daily News in an interview at her Queens district office on Wednesday. “Our voting laws are horrifying in how they suppress the vote and how they disenfranchise voters on a regular basis.”

Cabán conceded on Tuesday, officially cementing Melinda Katz’s 60-vote win after six weeks of contentious recounts and court battles. Ocasio-Cortez said there is plenty blame to go around, but called out Cuomo for not signing an election reform bill that Cabán supporters believe could have put the Manhattan public defender over the top.

“New York State historically has been just as bad as any deep southern state when it comes to voter disenfranchisement, whether it’s poll locations changes, whether it’s having your ballot tossed out over technicalities even though you’re a registered Democrat, which also happened in this race,” Ocasio-Cortez said. “But it was legal disenfranchisement so that disenfranchisement was within the bounds of the law.”

Modern Socialists love the notion of Direct Democracy. But, they cannot abide losing fair and square. She even admits the counts were lawful, but, since her preferred candidate lost, obviously, things are Very Bad.

Read: Hot Take: AOC Accuses Democrats Of Voter Suppression When Her Candidate Loses »

Posted in Barking Moonbats, Democrats | 7 Comments | Trackback URL

If All You See…

By William Teach August 8, 2019 – 1:00 pm

…is an area flooding from too much carbon pollution, causing trees to die, you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is 357 Magnum, with a post on where most mass shootings occur.

Read: If All You See… »

Posted in If All You See | 13 Comments | Trackback URL

Bummer: Massive ICE Raid Captures 680 Illegal Aliens

By William Teach August 8, 2019 – 10:30 am

This is made the Open Borders advocates Very Upset

ICE raids on Mississippi food processing plants result in 680 arrests

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) said Wednesday that its officers had raided seven food processing plants in Mississippi and detained approximately 680 “removable aliens” in what a federal prosecutor described as “the largest single-state immigration enforcement operation in our nation’s history.”

Nearly 600 ICE agents swarmed the plants in Bay Springs, Carthage, Canton, Morton, Pelahatchie and Sebastapol, surrounding the perimeters to keep workers from fleeing.

“The execution of federal search warrants today was simply about enforcing the rule of law in our state and throughout our great country,” U.S. Attorney Mike Hurst said in a statement. ” I commend these federal agents, our state and local law enforcement partners, and our federal prosecutors for their professionalism and dedication to ensure that those who violate our laws are held accountable.”

Hopefully, everyone involved in running the plants will see civil and even criminal penalties if it can be shown that they did not do their due diligence to make sure the workers were authorized to work. And it should be noted that anyone not illegal was let go.

Shep Smith had a meltdown over the arrests. The Washington Post tries the “won’t someone think of the children” tactic, forgetting that the parents put their kids in this position by being law breakers.

Mayor is calling for citizens to break the law. Good job, Mayor! And you’re getting this

And this

As hot-takes.

Read: Bummer: Massive ICE Raid Captures 680 Illegal Aliens »

Posted in Illegal Immigration | 65 Comments | Trackback URL

The Green New Deal Must Be Global Or Something

By William Teach August 8, 2019 – 7:46 am

Poverty and eco-fascism for all!

The Green New Deal Must Be Global
For a planet-wide climate crisis, solutions must also span the planet.

June 2019 was the hottest June in recorded history. July was even hotter — in fact, it was the hottest month ever recorded worldwide, as a wide swath of the continental United States sweltered with heat indexes of over 100 degrees.

Unless new action is taken to curb emissions driving the climate crisis, warns the Union of Concerned Scientists in a new report, the worst is yet to come. By mid-century, nearly one-third of Americans could be experiencing a month or more every year with a heat index above 105 degrees.

Add in more frequent storms, flooding, and wildfires, and the scale of the crisis is harder and harder to ignore. Public opinion polls show that a majority of registered U.S. voters now favor the ambitious Green New Deal, details of which remain to be spelled out. But it’s clear that the crisis is global, and that solutions cannot be limited by national borders.

This means action on multiple fronts in all countries to prevent catastrophic worldwide damage. But both the drivers and the effects of climate change are distributed unevenly. The most vulnerable countries have contributed the least to causing the crisis. Rich countries, through their greenhouse gas emissions, have contributed the most.

Actual data shows that July was not the hottest ever recorded, but, that’s immaterial. When cold records are pointed out climate cultists will say that’s just weather. Or blame it on ‘climate change’. But, it doesn’t prove anthropogenic causation. Just warmth. Which happens during periods. And people might say they support the GND in theory, but, in practice, most aren’t willing to pay $10 a month to Do Something about Hotcoldwetdry.

The Green New Deal: Poverty for Everyone!

Johnson, the Texas Democrat who extended Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal with his own Great Society, was an old-school liberal, certainly on domestic policy. The political activist-agitators LBJ impugned then as “liberals” are today’s progressives—one might even call them reactionaries of the left.

Epitomizing them is Saikat Chakrabarti, the outgoing chief of staff for freshman Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y). Chakrabarti recently starred in a Washington Post article. The spotlight left a key to the influential staffer’s undemocratic mentality in shadows.

Chakrabarti, 33, acknowledged “The interesting thing about the Green New Deal,” Ocasio-Cortez’s multi-trillion dollar zero-carbon emissions mirage, “is it wasn’t originally a climate thing at all… Because we really think of it as a how-do-you-change-the-entire-economy thing.”

If people had the actual reasons for the GND and were told what it would actually do, would support among Independents collapse, and, heck, even drop below 50% for Democrats? Yes.

Chakrabarti seems to have deduced two things. First, he saw a glass largely full and still filling but for some still empty, and concluded he must first shatter the glass. After that, he apparently failed to consider that the dystopian streets of San Francisco — homeless people living in tents and defecating on sidewalks near high-rent high-rises, and the middle class and affordable housing squeezed by heavy taxes and constrictive zoning — might be a result of local “progressive” politics. The problem is that if his “change-the-entire-economy-thing” would ever be imposed, America as a whole might resemble those dystopian streets. If Soviet Russia, Cuba or Venezuela come to mind, consider India before 2014, when its prime minister, Narendra Modi, was elected.

San Francisco is a good approximation. The cost of living is through the roof. Rents are sky high, housing is sky high, and energy is sky high. Food is expensive. Everything is expensive. The GND is not about the climate or environment, it is about eco-fascism and instituting an Authoritarian governmental system based around the Socialistic belief in controlling the economy. But, it’s not real Socialism, since that would require that the government mostly leave us alone in our private lives. The GND would put heavy controls on citizens and private entities. Explain this to people, and let’s see how those polls go.

Read: The Green New Deal Must Be Global Or Something »

Posted in AGW Socialism, Global Warming | 5 Comments | Trackback URL
Pirate's Cove