Standing Athwart History, Yelling “Stop!”

William F. Buckley’s famous phrase is being lived out today by a Senator from South Carolina. Jim DeMint has fired a warning shot across the bow of Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi and Barack Obama. He’s leading a constitutional challenge against the mandatory insurance purchase wording in ObamaCare:

Ensign, DeMint to Force Vote on Health Care Bill Unconstitutionality

December 22, 2009 – WASHINGTON, D.C. – Today, U.S. Senators Jim DeMint (R-South Carolina) and John Ensign (R-Nevada), raised a Constitutional Point of Order on the Senate floor against the Democrat health care takeover bill on behalf of the Steering Committee, a caucus of conservative senators. The Senate will vote tomorrow on the bill’s constitutionality.

“I am incredibly concerned that the Democrats’ proposed individual mandate provision takes away too much freedom and choice from Americans across the country,” said Senator Ensign. “As an American, I felt the obligation to stand up for the individual freedom of every citizen to make their own decision on this issue. I don’t believe Congress has the legal authority to force this mandate on its citizens.”

“Forcing every American to purchase a product is absolutely inconsistent with our Constitution and the freedoms our Founding Fathers hoped to protect,” said Senator DeMint. “This is not at all like car insurance, you can choose not to drive but Americans will have no choice whether to buy government-approved insurance. This is nothing more than a bailout and takeover of insurance companies. We’re forcing Americans to buy insurance under penalty of law and then Washington bureaucrats will then dictate what these companies can sell to Americans. This is not liberty, it is tyranny of good intentions by elites in Washington who think they can plan our lives better than we can.”

Americans who fail to buy health insurance, according to the Democrats’ bill, would be subject to financial penalties. The senators believe the bill is unconstitutional because the insurance mandate is not authorized by any of the limited enumerated powers granted to the federal government. The individual mandate also likely violates the “takings” clause of the 5th Amendment.

The Democrats’ healthcare reform bill requires Americans to buy health insurance “whether or not they ever visit a doctor, get a prescription or have an operation.” If an American chooses not to buy health insurance coverage, they will face rapidly increasing taxes that will rise to $750 or 2% of their taxable income, whichever is greater.

The Congressional Budget Office once stated “A mandate requiring all individuals to purchase health insurance would be an unprecedented form of federal action. The government has never required people to buy any good or service as a condition of lawful residence in the United States.”

A legal study by scholars at the nonpartisan Heritage Foundation concluded: “An individual mandate to enter into a contract with or buy a particular product from a private party, with tax penalties to enforce it, is unprecedented– not just in scope but in kind–and unconstitutional as a matter of first principles and under any reasonable reading of judicial precedents.”

Good for them. Keep fighting this monstrosity.

A so;id majority of Americans oppose this legislation. Call your Congressional representative, call both of  your Senators. Make it abundantly clear that you will not keep them in office if they vote for this scam. Say it with a smile on your face – and mean it.  Tell them that you will support – with time and money – a challenger to them in the next election if they vote wrong on this bill. And mean that as well.

Be civil, be polite – and be completely unyielding. Mean what you say and be fully prepared to carry through.

Dig Deep

AllahPundit:

It’s legit. Her pops sent out a blast e-mail about it a little while ago and I’m told the link’s posted on his Facebook page, so fire away. Not that she’ll need the money: The lawsuit’s weak, the jury will be on her side, and apparently Hannity’s set to beam this link out to America on tonight’s show, which means she’ll be swimming in dough come morning. Still, it’s a way to thank her for her work and to reward her for her courage, which is now being recognized by U.S. Senators. Free advice to the fund administrators, though: Add a $5 option so that people can make micro-donations. There’s big money in that. Ask the president.

I’ll post the info for O’Keefe’s defense fund once it’s available. (Why don’t they have a joint fund, incidentally?)

Andrew Breitbart drew blood – serious blood – with this effort by O’Keefe and Giles. I fully expect that he will stand by them through this lawsuit, but kicking in some funds is a good thing, too. It sends a message that there is still a powerful opposition that will not be steamrollered in this country.

This Should Be Interesting

The Washington Post suddenly discovers James O’Keefe III and Hannah Giles, the team who put together the ACORN sting videos:

Much of America discovered James O’Keefe III and Hannah Giles through their hidden-camera, make-believe pimp and prostitute videos of ACORN employees giving advice about establishing a brothel with underage hookers.

But as far back as 2006 – well before the videos became a national sensation and conservative rallying cry – the fresh-faced O’Keefe and Giles connected with a pair of Washington conservative institutions that boast programs training ideological journalists.

Now, due to coordinated promotion of the undercover sting footage by influential players in the conservative media, Giles and O’Keefe have gone from part of the pack to movement superstars.

Giles, a 20-year-old sophomore at Florida International University, spent the summer on a $1,200-a-month internship with the National Journalism Center, a training organization whose alumni include conservative commentator Ann Coulter. Immediately after graduating Rutgers University in 2006, O’Keefe, 25, was paid to set up magazines and newspapers on university campuses for the Leadership Institute, which recruits potential conservative public policy and media stars.

Each has other credentials that place them squarely in the network of activists who believe liberal-leaning mainstream media willfully ignore stories that illustrate the failings of the political left and its leaders.

Ok, then. Got the slant on the article? They are “professional” activists. As opposed to what? What ACORN is? They are not getting billions in taxpayer money to do what they are doing, unlike ACORN. Go read the whole thing, because O’Keefe and Giles come out looking very, very good, while ACORN looks – if anything – even worse than ever.

O’Keefe and Giles are now being sued by ACORN – and one simply cannot wait for the discovery phase. Because ACORN has a lot to lose here. The suit is, frankly, stupid. ACORN fired the employees involved right after the videos aired – they are going to get their butts handed to them in court – after a lot more dirty laundry gets aired out.

UPDATE: The lawsuit against the makers of the ACORN sting videos is now really, really big news in the media – unlike the videos themselves. But the media is on the wrong side on this one. If the lawsuit does succeed, the cherished ambush, hidden video techniques of the media are shut right off. Think about that, MSM. Stop carrying water for Obama and start doing your job.

Continuous Jeopardy

Seven former directors of the CIA have publicly asked Barack Obama to rein in Eric Holder’s witch hunt against the CIA. They have several very good reasons as to why this whole thing should be stopped – right now – but this is one that most people will understand right away: this is digging old dirt in hopes of finding a new nugget.

The post-September 11 interrogations for which the Attorney General is opening an inquiry were investigated four years ago by career prosecutors. The CIA, at its own initiative, forwarded fewer than 20 instances where Agency officers appeared to have acted beyond their existing legal authorities. Career prosecutors under the supervision of the US Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia determined that one prosecution (of a CIA contractor) was warranted. A conviction was later obtained. They determined that prosecutions were not warranted in the other cases. In a number of these cases the CIA subsequently took administrative disciplinary steps against the individuals involved. Attorney General Holder’s decision to re-open the criminal investigation creates an atmosphere of continuous jeopardy for those whose cases the Department of Justice had previously declined to prosecute.

Holder has said not a single word about investigating the operators of a Child-Whoring Pimp Assistance Program, ACORN. Apparently, all of his time is absorbed in trying to punish people who were trying to operate within what they were told was the legal envelope for their actions.

What legal envelope gives ACORN immunity from scrutiny from Holder? Newt Gingrich would like to know the answer to that:

The excuse offered by ACORN’s remaining defenders is essentially this: Sure, the tapes are reprehensible, but otherwise, ACORN does good work in poor communities. This excuse is unconvincing when used by defenders of the terrorist group Hamas and it’s unconvincing here. Americans can no longer allow Washington to turn a blind eye – much less fund – an organization that uses the suffering of our most vulnerable citizens as a cover for its illegal and illicit activities.

Why is Holder silent on ACORN but ‘way bullish on low-level CIA people who thought they were following binding legal advice?

Anyone doubt this is about who ACORN supports? Anyone? Anyone? Holder?

An ACORN Falls

This is huge. The reeking stench of not one, but two ACORN offices cheerfully giving advice on how to traffic underage girls from another country into prostitution has finally made the US Census Bureau cut all ties to the organization:

FNC’s Major Garrett reports on Twitter that the U.S. Census Bureau has cut all ties to ACORN, which had been named a Census data collection partner for the 2010 Census.

Census director Robert Groves, an ACORN-approved nominee, reportedly sent a letter to the racketeers today in the wake of Big Government’s videotaped stings in Baltimore and DC.

Now, on to a full investigation of the ACORN Housing Corporation, CSI, CCI, Project Vote and the Obama campaign.

No more taxpayer funding for this corrupt racket.

Cut ‘em all off NOW.

Obama’s so-called “stimulus” bill included billions of dollars for ACORN. Demand that that money be stopped or refunded if already disbursed.

If you have no idea what this post is about, watch and learn.

(Incidentally, I will be adding Andrew Breitbart’s Big Government blog to the blogroll as soon as I finish this post.)

This is the organization that Barack Obama once gave training sessions to. The only words that will pass my self-imposed standards here at the Crabitat are yuck and yuck. 

Demand Congress stop all payments to this disgusting organization NOW. Demand money back if it has already been sent out.

No public funds for such as these.

Exit question: Could there be a RICO opening here? Not a lawyer, I’m curious about that.

No Fundamental Right To Possess A Gun

Judge Sonia Sotomayor’s stance on gun ownership:

Judge Sonia Sotomayor could walk into a firestorm on Capitol Hill over her stance on gun rights, with conservatives beginning to question some controversial positions she’s taken over the past several years on the Second Amendment.

Earlier this year, President Obama’s Supreme Court nominee joined an opinion with the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals ruling that Second Amendment rights do not apply to the states.

A 2004 opinion she joined also cited as precedent that “the right to possess a gun is clearly not a fundamental right.”

Ken Blackwell, a senior fellow with the Family Research Council, called Obama’s nomination a “declaration of war against America’s gun owners.”

Such a line of attack could prove more effective than efforts to define Sotomayor as pro-abortion, efforts that essentially grasp at straws. Sotomayor’s record on that hot-button issue reveals instances in which she has ruled against an abortion rights group and in favor of anti-abortion protesters, making her hard to pigeonhole.

But Sotomayor’s position on gun control is far more crystallized.

Blackwell, who also ran unsuccessfully to head the Republican National Committee, told FOX News her position is “very, very disturbing.”

“That puts our Second Amendment freedoms at risk,” he said. “What she’s basically saying is that your hometown can decide to suppress your Second Amendment freedoms.”

This is disturbing. This is a pretty clear definition of Sotomayor’s legal beliefs about what the Supreme Court just affirmed as a fundamental right, isn’t it?

There is a tremendous shortage of ammunition right now because people are stocking up in anticipation of a gun-grab by the Democrats in the near future. I would think that this candidate’s views on gun ownership would not be instilling any confidence among those people. 

I may have to order some more ammunition, myself.

Words Matter

“I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn’t lived that life.” - Judge Sonia Sotomayor, 2001 speech at the Berkeley school of law

Let’s rephrase that, shall we?

“I would hope that a wise white man with the richness of his experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a Latina female who hasn’t lived that life.”

Any doubt, whatsoever, that the latter, rephrased statement would have put the left and the media (redundant) into a screeching frenzy? Any doubt at all?

I will not hang the label or debate the label that is being flung mightily about right now in the media and the blogosphere. What I will point out is that had a white male candidate for the Supreme Court actually made the revised statement, I would have had a problem with him. And would have said so.

Here’s Vincent Carroll from the link:

While Sotomayor’s comparison of the relative wisdom of Latina women and white men has garnered most of the attention in her Berkeley speech, it was hardly her only eyebrow-raising remark that day. After wondering “whether by ignoring our differences as women or men of color we do a disservice both to the law and society,” she then added, “Whatever the reasons why we may have different perspectives, either as some theorists suggest because of our cultural experiences or as others postulate because we have basic differences in logic and reasoning, are in many respects a small part of a larger practical question we as women and minority judges in society in general must address.”

Is she really suggesting that men and women, as well as people of different races, “have basic differences in logic and reasoning” in approaching legal issues? Once again, can you imagine a prominent white male saying such a thing without a legion of critics demanding that he do public penance?

Why, when Larry Summers was Harvard president, his claim that the distribution of innate aptitude might partly explain the ratio of men and women in science careers provoked such a furor that he was forced to backtrack, grovel and eventually resign (although as director of the White House’s National Economic Council, he certainly landed on his feet).

Sotomayor’s statement was far less nuanced than Summers’, and yet was obviously deliberate, since she restated it within minutes.

“Whether born from experience or inherent physiological or cultural differences . . .,” she declared, “our gender and national origins may and will make a difference in our judging.”

I think intellectually honest people, regardless of political persuasion, have to admit that these statements by Sonia Sotomayor are a real problem. Had they been made by a white male, that person would already be out of contention.

Via Memeorandum

Is There An Echo In Here?

Marc Ambinder publishes the not-for-publication talking points that the Obama White House sent out to back Obama’s nomination of Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court.

If you go over to Memeorandum, you can play along at home in a rousing game of “Spot the Talking Points!” (Also known as “EchoMania!”)

Here’s a line from the New York Times:

President Obama announced on Tuesday that he will nominate the federal appeals judge Sonia Sotomayor for the Supreme Court, choosing a daughter of Puerto Rican parents raised in a Bronx public housing project to become the nation’s first Hispanic justice.

Versus the talking point:

Born to a Puerto Rican family, Judge Sotomayor grew up in a public housing project in the South Bronx.   

My 7th grade teacher would have failed me for that paltry re-write.

I warned conservatives that failing to vote was a mistake – because the courts were the real thing in play. (Of course, I had no idea how much economic damage Obama could do in such a short time then).

Not Exactly

I am not a lawyer, so take what I write here with some degree of skepticism. I see two items pop up on Memeorandum and read them both. I am not reassured by either analysis.

Item the first:

The Constitution’s protection of an individual right to have guns for personal use restricts the powers of state and local government as much as it does those of the federal government, the Ninth Circuit Court ruled Monday. The opinion by the three-judge panel can be found here. This is the first ruling by a federal appeals court to extend the Second Amendment to the state and local level. Several cases on the same issue are now awaiting a ruling by the Seventh Circuit Court.

Item the second:

Well, today the Ninth Circuit (the federal appellate court covering most Western states) ruled that the Second Amendment restricts the power of state and local governments to interfere with individual right to have guns for personal use. That is, the Fourteenth Amendment “incorporates” the Second Amendment against the states, as the Supreme Court has found it to do for most of the Bill of Rights. I rarely get a chance to say this, but the Ninth Circuit gets it exactly right.

Here’s the problem, from the first cited link:

But, following the lead of the Supreme Court’s decision last June in District of Columbia v. Heller, finding a personal right in the Second Amendment for the first time, the Circuit Court concluded that the right as interpreted by the Justices is limited to “armed self-defense” in the home. (Emphasis added)

From my reading of this, the decision is not a sweeping victory for the individual right to keep and bear arms. Rather, it is a sweeping victory for people to keep guns in their homes. Period.

Perhaps I am not nuanced enough in my reading of this “victory” for the rights of the Second Amendment. But, to me, this sounds a lot like the Federal right can be interpreted as being fairly meaningless at the local level. (The plaintiffs, incidentally, lost this decision. In effect, a county government can restrict the right to keep and bear arms, as I read this.) 

 Maybe someone can explain this better than I can. But the right to keep and bear arms in your own home isn’t all that much of a victory, as I see it.

Latrunculi

Mackubin Thomas Owens on “the common enemies of mankind” as the Romans named them:

Second, the various new substitutes for “unlawful enemy combatant” abolish an important distinction in traditional international law. As the eminent military historian Sir Michael Howard argued shortly after 9/11, the status of al Qaeda terrorists is to be found in a distinction first made by the Romans and subsequently incorporated into international law by way of medieval and early modern European jurisprudence. According to Mr. Howard, the Romans distinguished between bellum (war against legitimus hostis, a legitimate enemy) and guerra (war against latrunculi, pirates, robbers, brigands and outlaws).

Bellum became the standard for interstate conflict, and it is here that the Geneva Conventions were meant to apply. They do not apply to guerra. Indeed, punishment for latrunculi, “the common enemies of mankind,” traditionally has been summary execution.

Though they don’t often employ the term, many legal experts agree that al Qaeda fighters are latrunculi — hardly distinguishable by their actions from pirates and the like. Robert Kogod Goldman, an American University law professor has commented: “I think under any standard, the captured al Qaeda fighters simply do not meet the minimum standards set out to be considered prisoners of war.” And according to Marc Cogen, a professor of international law at Ghent University in Belgium, “no ‘terrorist organization’ thus far has been deemed a combatant under the laws of armed conflict.” Thus al Qaeda members “can be punished for all hostile acts, including the killing of soldiers, because they have no right to participate directly in hostilities.” But the Obama administration is about to extend legal rights — intended to protect civilians — to the very latrunculi who want to blow them up by considering the possibility of trying them in U.S. courts. Indeed, Attorney General Holder did not rule out trying the Somali pirates.

This is, of course, in response to the Obama administration’s verbal gyrations in abolishing the name “War on Terror” and renaming “Enemy Combatants” as “individuals captured in connection with armed conflicts and counterterrorism operations.”  Or maybe they are going to downsize that name and just call them “Herbie.”

Somehow, we have managed to lose those subtle, but important distinctions in where these rules and “laws” between nations were meant to apply.

Political Hit Job

I heard about this on the drive home:

The Justice Department on Wednesday asked a federal judge to drop all charges against former Sen. Ted Stevens of Alaska.

A jury convicted Stevens last fall of seven counts of lying on his Senate disclosure form in order to conceal $250,000 in gifts from an oil industry executive and other friends. Stevens was the longest-serving Republican in the Senate. However, he lost his bid for an eighth full term in office just days after he was convicted. Since then, charges of prosecutorial misconduct have delayed his sentencing and prompted defense motions for a new trial.

In a move first reported by NPR, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said he has decided to drop the case against Stevens rather than continue to defend the conviction in the face of persistent problems stemming from the actions of prosecutors.

“After careful review, I have concluded that certain information should have been provided to the defense for use at trial,” Holder said in a statement Wednesday. “In light of this conclusion, and in consideration of the totality of the circumstances of this particular case, I have determined that it is in the interest of justice to dismiss the indictment and not proceed with a new trial.”

WaPo has this little gem:

The move comes as the judge was preparing to conduct hearings to probe allegations of prosecutorial misconduct by the team that tried one of the most powerful Republicans in Congress last year. The request, made in a court filing, caps the controversial prosecution of Stevens, who requested an early trial to clear his name but was convicted just days before he lost a reelection bid.

Back to Nina Totenberg’s report:

In addition to Wednesday’s decision to drop the case against Stevens, Holder has also ordered an internal Justice Department review of the prosecutors’ conduct. An adverse decision from the Office of Professional Responsibility would be ruinous for the prosecutors, including the top two career officials in the Public Integrity Section.

Every, single conviction won by the prosecutors in this case is now open to appeal. Every, single prosecution they brought is now suspect.

If they did what Holder appears to confirm that they did, they need to be in court again. This time as defendants.

This looks like a political hit job and some very serious questions need to be answered very soon.

Pelosi Tramples The Constitution

John at Power Line is more than a bit upset by the antics of the Pelosi-led House:

I’m stupefied to find that some people are defending the constitutionality of Nancy Pelosi’s discriminatory, confiscatory and retroactive tax on people who receive bonus income from companies that got TARP money. I would have considered it a bright line rule that the government can’t identify a class of unpopular people and impose a special tax on them. What’s next? A 100% income tax on registered Republicans, retroactive to last year? If Pelosi’s bill passes muster, why not?

To me, this thuggish, retroactive law is a pretty clear violation of Article 1, section 9 of the United States Constitution:

No bill of attainder or ex post facto Law shall be passed.

It is lousy law and Congress needs to pull back from this assault on the Constitution. I cannot imagine this thing passing muster at the Supreme Court.

There are plenty of people to get mad at in the AIG fiasco. But the voters should direct their anger at the folks who specifically allowed the AIG bonuses in the first place.

That would be the Democrats in Congress (along with three Republicans) and Barack Obama.

Don’t let them trample the constitution to divert attention from their actions.

Via Memeorandum.

UPDATE: Kim Priestap at Wizbang notes that there is at leat one grownup in the US Senate:

Finally, an adult has stepped up and slowed down the AIG tax that has already passed the House. Senator Jon Kyl blocked the AIG tax and is keeping it from going any further lest even more damage could be done by rushing another poorly crafted piece of legislation through.

 Good for him.

To Seat Or Not To Seat

I have heard a number of pundits cheerfully express – with great confidence – that If Rod Blagojevich were to appoint someone to the Senate that that body would “refuse to seat him (or her). Turns out it isn’t that simple. Supreme Court cases on the matter of seating members seems to favor Blagojevich. It is not anywhere near as cut and dried as the pundits want it to be.

Washington – Senate Democrats threatened this week to refuse to seat any new Illinois senator chosen by embattled Gov. Rod Blagojevich, but it is not clear the senators have the legal authority to reject a fully qualified appointee.

In 1969, the Supreme Court ruled the House of Representatives could not refuse to seat Rep. Adam Clayton Powell, a New York Democrat who was accused of putting his wife on the payroll and misusing travel funds to vacation in the Caribbean. Despite those charges, he was reelected by his constituents in Harlem. “The Constitution does not vest in the Congress a discretionary power to deny membership by majority vote,” wrote Chief Justice Earl Warren. Congress may “judge only the qualifications set forth in the Constitution,” he said.

The qualifications are minimal. A senator must be at least 30 years old, a U.S. citizen and “an inhabitant” of the state. The ruling in the Adam Clayton Powell case served as a precedent in 1995 when the Supreme Court struck down term limits for members of Congress. The justices said the states may not add extra qualifications.

Are there any restrictions on who Blagojevich could appoint? I don’t Think there are. This is the section of Illinois law that covers the filling of a vacancy in the US Senate:

(10 ILCS 5/25?8) (from Ch. 46, par. 25?8)
Sec. 25?8. When a vacancy shall occur in the office of United States Senator from this state, the Governor shall make temporary appointment to fill such vacancy until the next election of representatives in Congress, at which time such vacancy shall be filled by election, and the senator so elected shall take office as soon thereafter as he shall receive his certificate of election.
(Source: Laws 1943, vol. 2, p. 1.)

Many states have restrictions on the governor blocking him from appointing himself. It surprises me not at all that Illinois has no such restriction. They also have no limits on campaign contributions.

So the nightmare scenario for Democrats: Blagojevich simply appoints himself. They can’t keep him out of the Senate and he has a really, really big soapbox to stand on and raise hell. Blagojevich has just about zero – no, less than that – left in political capital right now. It is this or naming names to get a lighter sentence. (Bonus question: which of those two options strikes more fear into Democratic politicians?)

No, I am not advocating any such thing. He’s a crook and deserves the full weight of the justice system stomping down on him. I point this out more to take issue with those confident pundits out there.

Judicial Fiat Equates Humans With Dogs

A state district court judge in Montana has simply issued a ruling that would make assisted suicide perfectly legal in that state. No legislation, just a ruling from the bench. No checks or balances, merely a judicial fiat. And the reasoning that the judge applied to this steps right over the edge of that slippery slope. You see, Judge Dorothy McCarter used a line of reasoning that equates humans and their pets.

“I mean, we put our pets to sleep when they’re suffering and that’s considered humane,” she said. “And yet, if we want to do it to our loved ones, it’s considered murder.”

Think that line of reasoning through. While the judge is saying that any “mentally competent terminally ill Montanan…” can decide to die with a doctor’s help, pets are put down by those that are responsible for their care. How long until the judge’s fiat morphs into that? How long until families can simply make that decision for an incompetent Montanan? Or one who’s heirs don’t want the Montanan’s estate “squandered” on medical care? Note that the judge even put it in those terms: “…if we want to do it to our loved ones….”

This is appalling from both a legal and a moral standpoint. If Montanans genuinely want the right to die, they should get a law passed to allow it. These things are not simply imposed by a judge. The judge’s poorly thought out decision leaves the door open for real abuse in the future, besides being an abuse of her position. We are not supposed to be ruled by judges.

What’s Coming

Bob Owens points to the actions of the new sheriff of Orange County, California:

In California, Orange County Sheriff Sandra Hutchens unveiled a new policy that could cause “dozens, if not hundreds,” of concealed carry permit holders to lose permits issued by the previous sheriff. Did these law-abiding Orange County citizens do anything illegal, immoral, or unethical to cost them their permits?

No, they’ve merely fallen afoul of a sheriff that spent the bulk of her career as a deputy in the Los Angeles County prison system, and who apparently has issues with trusting those citizens she was appointed to serve.

Hutchens’ new policy requires that to get a concealed firearm permit, applicants must prove there is a legitimate threat to their safety and agree to undergo possible psychological, polygraph, or medical testing.

Add to that what David Kopel posted yesterday at The Volokh Conspiracy about Obama’s choice for Attorney General, Eric Holder:

As Deputy Attorney General, Holder was a strong supporter of restrictive gun control. He advocated federal licensing of handgun owners, a three day waiting period on handgun sales, rationing handgun sales to no more than one per month, banning possession of handguns and so-called “assault weapons” (cosmetically incorrect guns) by anyone under age of 21, a gun show restriction bill that would have given the federal government the power to shut down all gun shows, national gun registration, and mandatory prison sentences for trivial offenses (e.g., giving your son an heirloom handgun for Christmas, if he were two weeks shy of his 21st birthday). He also promoted the factoid that “Every day that goes by, about 12, 13 more children in this country die from gun violence”–a statistic is true only if one counts 18-year-old gangsters who shoot each other as “children.”(Sources: Holder testimony before House Judiciary Committee, Subcommitee on Crime, May 27,1999; Holder Weekly Briefing, May 20, 2000. One of the bills that Holder endorsed is detailed in my 1999 Issue Paper “Unfair and Unconstitutional.”)

After 9/11, he penned a Washington Post op-ed, “Keeping Guns Away From Terrorists” arguing that a new law should give “the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms a record of every firearm sale.” He also stated that prospective gun buyers should be checked against the secret “watch lists” compiled by various government entities. (In an Issue Paper on the watch list proposal, I quote a FBI spokesman stating that there is no cause to deny gun ownership to someone simply because she is on the FBI list.)

Remember how very narrow the Heller decision was. Only five justices supported an individual right to keep and bear arms. We are only one vote away from having our rights taken away. In Orange county, it has already begun despite the Supreme Court decision.