History, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Social Commentary, Technology and Society

The Right To Bear Arms

…is not up for debate:

When debating the wisdom of the Constitution’s Second Amendment, the media tends to start from the presumption that the question is purely scientific, and that the answers can — and should — be derived from statistical analyses and relentless experimentation. This approach is mistaken. The right of the people to keep and bear arms is not the product of the latest research fads or exquisitely tortured “data journalism,” but a natural extension of the Lockean principles on which this country was founded. It must be protected as such.

…Reacting to this argument, we often hear advocates of gun control propose that the Founders’ observations are irrelevant because they could “not have imagined the modern world.” I agree with the latter assertion: They couldn’t have. As well-read in world history as they were, there is no way that they could have foreseen just how prescient they were in insisting on harsh limitations of government power. In their time, “tyranny” was comparatively soft — their complaints focused on under-representation and the capricious restriction of ancient rights. In the past century, by contrast, tyranny involved the systematic execution of entire groups and the enslavement of whole countries. The notion that if James Madison had foreseen the 20th century he would have concluded that the Bill of Rights was too generous is laughable.

Nor could the Founders have imagined the entrenched tyranny that would arise in their own country. Washington, Jefferson, Madison and Company were hypocrites, certainly — like so many at the time they spoke of equality and liberty while indulging slavery — but the generation that met at Philadelphia did at least consider that the institution would die out peacefully. Instead, it was abolished only by bloody force, and then transmuted into something almost as abhorrent.

And as he notes, proposals for gun control have always been profoundly racist, and remain so.

[Update a while later]

Related: The historical African-American tradition of firearms.

[Afternoon update]

No, the right to bear arms isn’t absolute. So what?

History, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, War Commentary

Mean People Are Lying About Hillary Again

1 Comment

Remember in the 90s when those lying women were accusing poor Hillary’s husband of sexual harassment and rape?

Well now those terrible Benghazi families are lying about what she told them on the tarmac:

“I gave Hillary a hug and shook her hand. And she said ‘we are going to have the film maker arrested who was responsible for the death of your son,’” recalls Tyrone Woods’ father, reading directly from his written record from that day. Sean Smith’s mother and uncle remember the same thing, as does Glen Doherty’s sister. Now watch Hillary’s performance from this past Sunday. Note how anchor George Stephanopoulos, to his credit, asks a very specific question, preceded by clips of statements from several of the aforementioned family members.

I’ll bet Woods’ father was lying to his diary, like that guy in the Clinton administration. It must be terrible to be a Clinton, and always have people telling lies about you.

Business, Economics, Mathematics, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Science And Society, Technology and Society

Mark Steyn’s Testimony

2 Comments

There will probably be some reportage of yesterday’s hearing, but Anthony Watts has his written testimony.

[Update a while later]

Bishop Hill has the video of Mark shredding the climate fascists on the committee.

[Update a couple minutes later]

Here is the video: A State Ideology.

[Update a few minutes later]

Here’s the story from Michael Bastasch.

[Late-morning update]

Here’s some whining at The Hill by some idiot from Texas, who thinks that Judith Curry is a “denier.”

Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Social Commentary, War Commentary

The Democrats And Gun Control

11 Comments

This is what it looks like when the tide is turning:

Everyone sees that Obama and his minions not only cannot protect us, but that they will actively seek to stop us from doing it ourselves.

Everyone sees that Obama is simply trying to not let this crisis go to waste by stripping real Americans of their ability to protect themselves from Islamist murderers – and from his fascist dreams.

Everyone sees that we are on our own.

Bill Clinton definitely gets it; for all his myriad faults, he knows Americans and he knows “Give me your guns even though I’m utterly incompetent” won’t sell outside of Manhattan. It is even dawning on Hillary, a woman so dumb that she failed the District of Columbia bar exam. And it’s dawning on the down-ticket Dems who had been dreaming of retaking the Senate in 2016, but now get to run in red states on the platform of “Let’s bring in more Muslim immigrants and take your guns!”

But they can’t help themselves. They’re imploding.

[Late-morning update]

The Democrats have become unhinged and ugly on gun control.

To be fair to them, that’s not really anything new.

Education, General Science, Mathematics, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Science And Society, Technology and Society

Peer Review

6 Comments

(From a surprising source) let’s stop pretending that it works.

They can’t do that. It cuts the legs from under one of the primary weapons they use against critics of catastrophic anthropogenic climate change.

[Update a few minutes later]

Related: Senator Cruz’s climate hearing with Judith Curry, John Christie, Mark Steyn et all is today at noon PST. Get out the popcorn.

Biting Commentary about Infinity…and Beyond!