THE PATRIOT POST - ALEXANDER'S COLUMN 02/21/2018

Democrat Common Sense — A Non-Sequitur

Whenever the words "common sense" come out of a Democrat's pie hole, caveat emptor.

By Mark Alexander · February 21, 2018   

"The ultimate authority ... resides in the people alone. ... The advantage of being armed, which the Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation ... forms a barrier against the enterprises of ambition, more insurmountable than any..." —James Madison (1788)

There's a lot of Democrat chatter this week about "common-sense gun control," their ubiquitous terminology for undermining what our Founders understood to be the First Civil Right of all people.

"To Keep and Bear Arms" is the unalienable right enumerated in the Second Amendment to our Constitution. It is thus second only to the First, but make no mistake: It guarantees the First and all others.

Frankly, whenever the words "common sense" come out of a Democrat's pie hole, caveat emptor — all critical thinkers should vigorously challenge with prejudicial skepticism whatever follows thereafter.

In the wake of the Parkland, Florida, high school murders by a sociopathic assailant using a firearm, we cannot overlook the abject failure of federal, state and local agencies to intervene despite having been warned of the risk posed by this individual.

But it's the response from Donald Trump versus that from Barack Obama which demonstrates the great divide between Republicans and Democrats on the causation for such violent acts.

Republicans, rightly and consistently, call attention to the cultural factors that result in violence — the statist policies that have propagated that culture, and the fact that young minds are inculcated with a saturation of media violence. On the other hand, Democrats predictably focus on the inanimate objects used to commit violence (in this case a semi-automatic rifle), the latter being a much easier target, as well as a tactic within a larger leftist objective — constriction of the Second Amendment and, ultimately, gun confiscation.

When I contemplate the words "common sense," it first invokes the notion of an understanding of something which is universally shared.

Second, I think of the 1776 pamphlet, "Common Sense," published by Thomas Paine, which framed the cause and call for undertaking the fatigues necessary to defend American Liberty thusly: "The cause of America is in a great measure the cause of all mankind."

Clearly, Democrats long ago abandoned Paine's understanding of "common sense" as it related then and now to supporting and sustaining Liberty for this and future generations. That understanding is in direct conflict with the statist policies they advocate.

So, to consider what should be inferred from their use of "common sense" in regard to the Second Amendment, here are a few examples from the past week.

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA): "Congress has a moral responsibility to take common sense action to prevent the daily tragedy of gun violence in communities across America." (In other words, anyone who doesn't comply with the Democrats' political agenda is immoral.)

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo: "The president should follow our lead and advance common sense gun safety legislation." (Make no mistake, by "gun safety" Cuomo means "gun confiscation.")

Speaking for leftist celebrity hypocrites, Jimmy Kimmel: "This is the perfect example of common sense. ... This is a mental illness issue, because if you don't think we need to do something about it, you are mentally ill." (That's right, forget the mentally ill perpetrator. If you don't agree with Kimmel, you're mentally ill.)

Of course, leftist editorial pages and advocacy groups across the nation, funded by the billionaire archenemies of Liberty who support them, are insisting on "common sense" gun control measures.

The socialist Daily Kos: "Are we ever going to have common sense gun laws?"

MoveOn.org: "Let's talk common sense. The National Rifle Association [is] one of the main reasons we remain unable to pass common sense gun laws."

Most notably, within hours of the latest tragedy in Florida, the two most prominent Democrats in the nation were leading the "common sense" bandwagon, including the Orwellian BIG lie that "most Americans agree" with them.

Hillary Clinton: "The majority of Americans support common sense gun reform." (Fortunately the majority of Electoral College votes did not support Clinton.)

Barack Obama: "Caring for our kids is our first job, and until we can honestly say that we're doing enough to keep them safe from harm, including long overdue, commonsense gun safety laws that most Americans want, then we have to change." (That's right, according to Obama, if you're a defender of Liberty and the Second Amendment, you don't "care for our kids," and when he says "gun safety laws" he means "gun confiscation.")

(Keep in mind, all of these politicos have taxpayer-funded armed security with them 24/7, and they reside in high-security, walled domiciles.)

So, what is it that Clinton and Obama, and their legions of socialist useful idiots, mean when they refer to "common sense" gun control measures?

Both Clinton and Obama have advocated for the Australian gun confiscation model, and implementation of that model in the future would be the Democrats' greatest legislative prize.

Obama declared in 2014: "The one area where I have been most frustrated ... is the fact that the United States of America is the one advanced nation on earth in which we do not have sufficient common sense gun safety laws. ... A couple decades ago, Australia ... basically imposed very severe, tough gun laws. ... This is something we should politicize. ... I would ask the American people to think about how they can get our government to change [our gun] laws."

During her 2016 campaign, Clinton likewise declared: "The Australian government ... offered a good price for buying hundreds of thousands of guns and then they basically clamped down on guns going forward. ... By offering to buy back those guns, they were able to curtail the supply. ... Several communities have done gun buy-back programs, but I think it would be worth doing on the national level."

Now, to be clear, when Obama says "imposed very severe, tough gun laws," he's referring to gun confiscation.

And when Clinton says "offering to buy back those guns," she's referring to gun confiscation, which she then says "would be worth doing on the national level."

As a resource for dealing with gun-grabbing leftists, earlier this week I posted a detailed transcript of a debate with a suburban lefty on the Australian gun confiscation issue — and much more regarding the Second Amendment.

Clearly, Australia isn't plagued with the broken families and the urban poverty plantations that five decades of failed Democrat social policies will engender. But appealing for gun control after a mass shooting is much easier than acknowledging the generational policy failures that account for most crime in the U.S.

The indisputable fact is this: If you don't have a violent criminal record, or have ties to drugs or gangs, the probability of your being murdered in the U.S. falls in line with other developed nations where most types of guns have been banned for years.

To that point, according to research regarding murders in the nation's second deadliest city, "The average homicide victim in Baltimore in 2017 had 11 previous arrests on his record. About 73 percent had drug arrests, and nearly 50 percent had been arrested for a violent crime. About 30 percent were on parole or probation at the time they were killed, and more than 6 percent were on parole or probation for a gun crime."

Similarly, "The average homicide suspect, meanwhile, had 9 previous arrests on his record. About 70 percent had drug arrests, and nearly half had been arrested for a violent crime. Nearly 36 percent were on parole or probation, and 6 percent were on parole or probation for a gun crime."

Here are a few more reality-check bullet points regarding the assault on the Second Amendment, ammunition for debate we should all be having with those who have bought into all the emotive "common sense" nonsense, including those unwitting teenage pawns being used to advance the Left's agenda.

The nation's most dangerous cities are invariably Democrat strongholds. More than half the murders in the U.S. occurred in 2% of the nation's counties. Show me a deadly city, and I'll show you a Democrat in charge of it.

For the record, the top urban crime centers have the most restrictive firearm regulations in the nation. Using Demo-logic, then, shouldn't these "gun-free zones" be the safest places in America?

If crime in America is a "gun problem" and not a cultural problem, then Switzerland should be a slaughterhouse. There are more full-auto assault rifles per capita in Switzerland than in any other Western nation, and yet the Swiss have one of the lowest homicide rates in the world — far lower than in the UK, which has the strictest gun laws in Europe and, now, one of the highest rates of crime. Several other Western nations with substantial numbers of guns in private hands, including Germany, Austria and Iceland, also have low homicide rates.

Despite all the Democrat rhetoric about "common sense," Obama had full legislative control of the 111th Congress in 2009, including a filibuster-proof Senate majority and a House with 257 Democrats and 178 Republicans. Democrats could have enacted every gun control measure they wanted at that time, much as they could have enacted their ruinous immigration policies. But they didn't.

Perhaps their understanding of "common sense" is not so common.

Crime in the U.S. has actually declined significantly over the last two decades. Concurrently, gun ownership in America has increased significantly, while homicides by assailants with guns have also declined.

Apparently, more guns, less crime.

While President Trump is going to take a second pass at outlawing some firearm modifications, which, in effect make them function like select-fire weapons, recall that there was a so-called "assault weapon ban" in place from 1994-2004, when it expired. Research by the Department of Justice determined that the ban had no impact on reducing crime, and implementation of another ban is unlikely.

And according to the FBI's latest annual crime statistics, rifles were used in 252 homicides, while knives were used in 1,544 homicides, blunt objects in 437 homicides and bare hands in 624 homicides.

The Leftmedia's saturation coverage (selling advertising on the blood of innocents) communicates this to potential future mass murderers:

1. We'll make sure you're famous by devoting all our air time to you.
2. As targets go, a school will get you the most attention, and nobody will shoot back.
3. Use an AR-15 — they're the most popular gun for the job, and then we will call it an "assault weapon."

What about the Leftmedia reports asserting that most Americans agree with added gun-control measures? This is a classic case of the tried-and-true "Pollaganda Effect," whereby the MSM inundates viewers with opinion masquerading as "journalism," then polls them on what they've just been told.

And it's these same media propagandists who are fomenting student protests nationwide this week.

We are all deeply affected when sociopaths slaughter innocents, regardless of their weapon of choice. But what is really at the core of the Left's gun hysterics is arrogance, and fear of armed common folks across the nation.

Tucker Carlson aptly summarized it up: "The calls you're hearing today for gun control have nothing to do with protecting Americans from violence. What you're witnessing is a kind of class war. The Left hates rural America, gun-owning America, the America that elected Donald Trump. They call it 'gun control.' It's not. It's people control. For the Left, voters who can't be controlled can't be trusted."

Here's the bottom line on "common sense" in regard to the Second Amendment: In his landmark work, "Commentaries on the Constitution" (1833), James Madison's Supreme Court Justice, Joseph Story, wrote, "The right of the citizens to keep and bear arms has justly been considered as the palladium of the liberties of a republic; since it offers a strong moral check against the usurpation and arbitrary power of rulers; and will generally, even if these are successful in the first instance, enable the people to resist and triumph over them."

Those words ring as true today as when first written.

Semper Vigilans Fortis Paratus et Fidelis
Pro Deo et Libertate — 1776