There’s an oldie but goodie from George Santayana which goes along the line (in various forms) ‘Those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it’. Which got me thinking this morning after I pulled up Joseph Klein’s piece in today’s FrontPageMag: ‘John Paul Stevens’ Anti-Second Amendment Hysteria’.
For those who wonder who he was/is, according to a New York Times op-ed, John Paul Stevens – a Gerald Ford Supreme Court appointee who emerged as a liberal voice on the court and who retired from the court at the age of 90 in 2010 – said the March for Our Lives demonstrations and civic engagement in the wake of last month’s Parkland, Fla., school shooting “demand our respect.” And while protesters were calling for legislation that would ban semi-automatic weapons, increasing the minimum age to buy guns and establishing more comprehensive background checks, he said they should seek a “more effective and more lasting reform.”
We the People could do worse than remember John Paul Stevens as the effervescent poster-boy [satirically intended as my sarcasm shows] for longevity as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, who sat, literally, from the time of his appointment by Gerald R. Ford in 1975 to his ‘retirement’ in 2010 at the age of 90. You got that right – 90!
Now 97 going on 98, the liberal goat is still up to his old antics of attempting to shred the Constitution of the United States; at 97 years of age. Whatever happened to the Statute of Limitations?!
Joseph Klein’s opener…
Former Associate Justice John Paul Stevens was a foe of any broad reading of the Second Amendment while he served on the U.S. Supreme Court. He dissented from the 2008 majority decision in the District of Columbia v. Heller case, which held that there was an individual right to bear arms. Mr. Stevens is now going even further in his retirement, writing an op-ed column for the New York Times entitled ‘John Paul Stevens: Repeal the Second Amendment.”
Mr. Stevens is of the view that the Second Amendment is an artifact with no current beneficial purpose to serve. “Concern that a national standing army might pose a threat to the security of the separate states,” he wrote in his op-ed column, “led to the adoption of that amendment, which provides that ‘a well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.’ Today that concern is a relic of the 18th century.”
In his op-ed column Mr. Stevens sharply criticized the Heller decision, which he wrote “has provided the N.R.A. with a propaganda weapon of immense power.” Mr. Stevens added: “Overturning that decision via a constitutional amendment to get rid of the Second Amendment would be simple and would do more to weaken the N.R.A.’s ability to stymie legislative debate and block constructive gun control legislation than any other available option.”
Mr. Stevens provides no reasoning in his op-ed column to speak of for getting rid of the Bill of Rights amendment to the Constitution protecting the right of the people to keep and bear arms that comes right after the First Amendment’s protection of free speech, free exercise of religion, the right to petition the government and the right of assembly. We need to look back at his dissenting opinion in District of Columbia v. Heller, joined by liberals Justice Souter, Justice Ginsburg, and Justice Breyer, to get a sense of his disdain for any continuing relevance of the Second Amendment in today’s society. In his dissent, he rejected the notion that the framers of the Constitution “intended to enshrine the common-law right of self-defense in the Constitution” or had “the slightest interest in limiting any legislature’s authority to regulate private civilian uses of firearms.”
Read to conclusion by clicking here…
Which behooves us to remember that there’s still another old goat slumbering on the bench of the Supreme Court who keeps nodding off at the State of the Union addresses and more. Remember who Ruth Bader Ginsburg is? Well compared to the 98-year-old Constitution-basher she’s a relatively-young 85 years of age. Whatever has happened to our Republic?
Didn’t take Daniel Greenfield long to state his position:
John Paul Stevens, a retired Supreme Court justice, is getting plenty of attention for a New York Times editorial titled, “Repeal the Second Amendment”.
The piece isn’t worth linking to or challenging. It’s full of the tiresome arguments you would expect. The second amendment is a relic of the 18th century and we need to get with the times and get rid of it.
And then maybe we can get to work on the first amendment.
Okay.
Stevens doesn’t make a compelling case for repealing the second amendment. He does make a compelling case for repealing the judiciary. Judicial supremacism and activism has long since supplanted the constitution. But the judiciary is there to serve the constitution. Not the other way around.
When an institution inhibits, poisons and outright attacks that which it is meant to serve, it becomes the problem.
The Bill of Rights is not the problem. Stevens is. A judiciary in which unelected officials base laws on their political views and invent their own legislation is a threat to the constitution.
Gun violence is not an institutional threat to the United States. Judicial supremacism is. If we’re going to repeal anything, it won’t be any element of the Bill of Rights. But if Stevens hadn’t retired, he would be on the bench right now pursuing his conviction that a major part of the Bill of Rights should not exist.
At 98 years of age! Such a kindly old grandfather, this ravenous wolf in sheep’s clothing.
Which illustrates just how important these Supreme Court Justices are in the overall grand scheme of things. Appointed, not elected. Accountable to no one. Open to all kinds of variable corruptions. (Chief Justice John Roberts and his capitulation on Obamacare rile anyone?) ‘Til death do us part’ never had greater implications than with the Supreme Court of the United States.
America has forever been full of the ‘enemies within’ and the current generation is seemingly no different. But as I constantly trumpet (pun intended) our nationalism, populism, and a new courageous president is all that stands in the way of these continuing threats from the liberal Leftist DemoMarxists. A real threat that we ignore at our peril.
Thank God for President Donald J. Trump – MAGA!
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For the record: Repeal the Judiciary