Nothing is inalienable

On Monday, a U.S. District Court judge struck down a Maryland gun law with a remarkably worded ruling, as related by the Baltimore Sun:

In a 23-page memorandum opinion, made public Monday, U.S. District Court Judge Benson E. Legg said a state requirement forcing those applying for a gun-carry permit to show that they have a "good and substantial reason" to do so "impermissibly infringes the right to keep and bear arms," as guaranteed by the Second Amendment.

"A citizen may not be required to offer a 'good and substantial reason' why he should be permitted to exercise his rights," Legg wrote. "The right's existence is all the reason he needs."

Wow, is this guy ever out-of-step with the times! What is this crazy talk of God-given inalienable rights, which the government is absolutely forbidden to transgress? Everyone knows that all rights are gifts of the State, to be redistributed or rescinded as the ruling class sees fit.

For example, no American citizen has anything approaching an absolute right to property. “Progressive taxation” is explicitly premised on the notion that increasing levels of income result in a sharply attenuated right to retain the fruits of your own labor and investment. In the wake of the Kelo vs. City of New London decision, it was decided that the government can seize your property, not in response to some desperate national emergency, but because it thinks it can use the property more effectively than you can, for “the greater good.”

Or look at the big story bubbling through the news right now, in which our wondrous new government-run health insurance system feels free to discard the religious sensibilities of certain Americans, in order to impose its superior wisdom in the matter of compulsory provision of birth control supplies. This edict is based on the precise opposite of Judge Legg’s ruling. Those stuffy old Catholics can’t show any “good and substantial reason” for exercising their religious conscience – not one that compares to the supposedly urgent need of students for “free” contraception in the eyes of the Obama commissars, at any rate – and so their objections are summarily dismissed.

The ObamaCare mandate in question makes a distinction between actual houses of worship, and institutions (such as Georgetown University or Catholic hospitals) run by religious organizations. In other words, churches themselves do have “good and substantial reason” for refusing to buy birth control, if it runs contrary to their teachings, but not operations run by the churches. Cleary, the existence of a right to religious expression is not “all the reason you need” to get out of paying for other peoples’ condoms.

What happens if a religious organization defies the commissars, and refuses to surrender its First Amendment rights? According to a report in Life News today, “Republicans in Congress asked the Congressional Research Service to examine the new mandate and the consequences for employers that do not want to follow it because it would violate their consciences and CRS issued a document finding noncompliant employers could face federal fines of $100 per day per employee.” Nothing that costs you a hundred bucks in fines per day is “inalienable.”

You had better forget all about the word “inalienable,” because an expanding State has no use for speed-bump “rights” which limit its ability to act. The program to re-educate Americans away from such an understanding of rights has been in progress for decades, and it’s worked extremely well. That’s one of the reasons we should be uneasy with the notion of Republicans campaigning against ObamaCare entirely because it’s unconstitutional. Of course it is, to the point of being a satirical exercise in Constitution-shredding. Sure, the Founders would have blessed a gigantic government program that forces citizens to buy stuff from other citizens, under the threat of legal penalty!

The problem is that much of the public has been trained to reflexively discard the notion that benevolent government power should be thwarted by arbitrary limits. The wise and wonderful State should not be prevented from addressing the vital needs of some citizens, because of an ancient obligation to respect the inalienable rights of others… especially when those others have lots of money. In other words, the hated Evil Rich cannot demonstrate “good and substantial reasons” why their rights should be respected.

Besides, the modern American citizen has been educated to perceive “positive rights” as physical gifts, bestowed by the State: the “right” to free health care, free condoms, and so forth. Such “rights” can only be fulfilled through the exercise of compulsive force. Absolutely nothing is “free,” but many things can be made compulsory. Understand the difference, and you’ll understand why, contrary to the beautifully stated ruling of Judge Legg, the transcendent existence of your rights is no longer all the reason you need to justify holding on to them.

You are correct!!!

What gets me is the sarcasm in th earticle about how we should jut forget about these “inalienable” rights...(correction deliberately un-applied)...

Sorry, but I am not going to just give up without a fight...

If the opposition to my UNalienable rights sees that they need to pursue and remove my UNalienable rights because that gives them life, liberty and happiness...Ironically who am I (we) to keep them from pursuing that dream???

So there may be the rub...

But in reality, their pursuit of life liberty and happiness is not based upon any moral truth...

The problem is where is that line drawn...Many people believe a fight is coming, and nothing will stop it...They yern for it, they prepare for it, and let others try to fight it in the arena of politics...

That’s cool, I can dig it...I’ve tried to play both sides of that fence for years and have not been able to find the right combination of how to succeed in that effort...

And I believe that is where the opposition wants us to be, in constant flux and instability in trying to fight them politically (where they are winning) and where we dominate in the arena of preparing for the “real” fight”...where they have been winning to take away how effective we will be when the gauntlet is thrown down for real and we pick it up...

The problem I see is I do not believe there is much “real” happiness” in our future, because of the feckless nature of politics and those we send to protect our conservative principles are not able to do a good enough job for us in that regard...It is forcing many to believe that we may very well have a “real” fight on our hands soon, and in that case, I predict...

No one will win that battle...

Just my opinion...

The author is quite correct in his sarcasm of liberals demanding the power to control thoughts of others.

But it is such sarcasm that that clearly demonstrates their defective thought processes. Here is where he nails it.

The problem is that much of the public has been trained to reflexively discard the notion that benevolent government power should be thwarted by arbitrary limits.

Arbitrary limits? What they describe as "arbitrary" are those very unalienable rights! And what will pizz off a "progressive liberal" faster than calling little bammy "only half black" is laughing at their demand that you cower to their demands to obey their edicts of actions, behavior, speech, and beliefs.

And here is the correct logical conclusion contained in your post.

The "progressive liberals" will invariable react to this truth with ridicule and nervous laughter. They seem to have a deep underlying understanding that there is no "reverse" in their philosophy of liberalism. For them it is ever-increasing control of the narrative and demand more obedience in action and expressed beliefs.

Without such a reverse gear they are trapped and have no other path than to drive normal American Citizens to eventually get a bellyfull of their liberal bullshit and thus provoke backlash.

They then will describe such a reaction to being provoked beyond endurance as "proof" that they are right and only they are capable of judging who is being "civil" and who is out of control. Who should be in "control" and who should be supervised.

When that point is reached the reaction of such normal American Citizens that actual do understand their rights and the rights of others is a swift and total zeroing of THEIR tolerance to the "progressive liberals."

The results are frightful indeed. Such reactions resulted in the following...

Scenes such as this;

and this;

You get the idea.

It is my understanding that even in the face of total destruction the "progressive liberal" National Socialists believed such results could have been avoided if the uncouth, uneducated and unsophisticated enemy (us) could have been made to understand they were right and we should allow them to control the world.

They knew exactly what they were really doing as their greatest fear was to be captured... by the OTHER socialists, the Russians. The communist/socialist/Marxist Russians knew what the National Socialist Germans were up to and said Russians were totally committed to destroying them as it was THEIR thing and did not need a bunch of uppity Nazi taking over.

Here, now, the "progressive liberals" that want socialism on a national level (National Socialism) also know exactly what they are really up to and it is all about total control.

You can not achieve that with those damn unalienable rights hanging around, they must be restrained with "common sense" laws.

Such laws initially appear to be good but government being inherently self-corrupting we soon find that the "common-sense laws" first stack up and then they increase by orders of magnitude. Every mistake or bad situation created by a bad or stupid "law" is "corrected" by government creating... more law.

Soon the pattern repeats, the normal Citizens have damn well had enough and the battle goes hot.

And the "progressive, liberal, educated elites" are invariable "shocked" at the "intolerance" of the unwashed peasants.

Terry Moore, WWII, Okinawa

James Blake Miller, Fallujah, Iraq

The Crew of "Pretty Baby."

And their wrath should be desired by the "progressive liberal" as the alternative is beyond terrifying.

So, you can see the motivation for the "progressive liberals" to gain and keep total control...

.

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