trying to grok

THE HELLER CASE

I didn't hear this on the radio the other day, but it's worth reading the whole thing before it becomes unavailable. Some excerpts:

RUSH: John Paul Stevens in his dissent on the DC gun ban bill today wrote that the majority, meaning Scalia and the gang, "would have us believe that over 200 years ago, the framers made a choice to limit the tools available to elected officials wishing to regulate civilian uses of weapons." Folks, that is scary. I know Justice Stevens has been around for a long time, but that kind of interpretation -- there is no way, I don't care how convoluted a way that you read the Second Amendment, there is nothing in it to indicate that the Framers intended to grant the federal government, elected officials, the right to police people.

I too was shocked to hear that statement. It seems like a really jacked-up and backwards way of looking at the Second Amendment. The Framers never envisioned a day when elected officials got to decide whether people could own guns.

And it just gets worse.

Here Jeffrey Toobin, legal expert, CNN, talking to Heidi Collins at CNN. Listen to this question. Memo to Jonathan Klein running CNN: Do you understand how incompetent some of the people you have on your network are? Listen to this question. Heidi Collins to Jeffrey Toobin: "Specifically, Jeffrey, that's really what it's about, isn't it, the Constitution trumping policy?" The Constitution trumping policy? The Constitution trumping policy? (interruption) Yes, of course it is, but for this to be a question to a legal scholar? Here's the answer.

TOOBIN: This is just a big, big event in American constitutional history because the Second Amendment has been a true mystery.

RUSH: No.

TOOBIN: No one really knew for decades what it meant --

RUSH: Yes, they did.

TOOBIN: -- in practical terms.

RUSH: Yes, they did.

TOOBIN: Now the Supreme Court, by and large just 5-4, has said that there is a constitutional right to own a handgun inside the home.

RUSH: Stop the tape here a second. The only reason, Mr. Toobin, anybody ever debated this is because people like you, liberals years and years ago tried to tell us it didn't mean that, and you've been passing laws throughout these local municipalities and states chipping away at the Second Amendment because you don't like it. Nobody had any question about this 'til you liberals got involved, tried to obfuscate it and confuse everybody about it. And now we have to get to the point where the Constitution, which is plainly clear in this case, has to be affirmed by the US Supreme Court?

I too am shocked to hear someone talk about "the Constitution trumping policy." All policy is derived from the Constitution. The Constitution always trumps.

Rush goes on. I mean, he was just on fire that day.

RUSH: One of the problems that we're having here in our culture with all of this is the bastardization of the meaning of the word "right," as in, to have a right. For example, look what the left is saying today. We don't have a right to own guns. I mean, that would be their preference, that there be no Second Amendment. Just get four or five justices to wipe it out. We have no right, even though the Constitution specifically says we do. Yet, they further the notion that we all have a "right" to health care. We do not have a right to health care! That we all have a "right" to a home. We do not have a right to a home! That we all have a "right" to go to college. We do not have a right to go to college, because those are not rights! That we have a "right" to be free of the pollution of oil. That is not a right.

That's good squishy.

Posted by Sarah at June 28, 2008 10:05 AM | TrackBack