AMERICANS DON'T NEED A LAW DECLARING THE “AR-15” THE “NATIONAL GUN OF THE UNITED STATES.”

DISCUSSION OF H.R. 1095

PART ONE

CONGRESSIONAL REPUBLICANS CAN DO BETTER THAN ENACT A LAW DECLARING THE AR-15 RIFLE THE NATIONAL GUN OF THE UNITED STATES. RATHER THE NATION NEEDS RECOGNITION OF THE RIGHT TO CARRY A HANDGUN, FOR SELF-DEFENSE, THROUGHOUT THE UNITED STATES.

Readers of Ammoland Shooting Sports News are probably aware of a House of Representatives Bill (H.R. 1095) introduced by Representative Barry Moore (Republican, Alabama) that “seeks to declare that an “AR-15 style rifle chambered in a .223 Remington round or a 5.56x45mm NATO round . . . the National Gun of the United States,” according to a summary of the legislation.” See New York Post article, published February 23, 2023.American Military News, in an article also published on February 23, 2023, adds this:“The bill’s [two] Republican co-sponsors include Georgia Rep. Lauren Boebert and New York Rep. George Santos. AR-15s and similar rifles are the most popular in the U.S., with more than 24.4 million in circulation, according to trade group data reported by The Reload. The rifles are often targets for gun control because they have been increasingly used in mass shootings over the last decade, as reported by USA Today.”‘The anti-Second Amendment group won’t stop until they take away all your firearms,’ Moore said in a statement reported by Al.com. ‘One rule to remember: any government that would take away one right would take away them all.’After bringing forward the bill for the AR-15’s national recognition last week, Moore stopped at a gun shop in Troy, Alabama on Tuesday to make the case for its passage. He said the AR-15 has been ‘a cornerstone of American culture for over 60 years,’ according to video taken at the event.’”Moore introduced the bill on the Floor of the House on February 17, 2023. The bill was referred to the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability, Introduction of a bill and referral to the bill are the first two actions in the legislative process, turning a bill into a Congressional statute. See the article in congress.gov, discussing this process.Often a bill languishes in Committee. This occurs when the House Speaker—or, if a bill is introduced in the Senate, the Senate Majority Leader—intends to kill it.Recall the ill-fated bill, H.R. 38, “Concealed Carry Reciprocity Act of 2017,” “a bill to amend title 18, United States Code, to provide a means by which nonresidents of a State whose residents may carry concealed firearms may also do so in the State.”An amended version of the bill passed the House after two Roll Call votes, on December 6, 2017, and went on to the Senate for action. Paul Ryan was the Speaker of the House, at that time. We were hopeful.Americans had their best shot at the passage of this bill since, at the time, Republicans controlled both Houses of Congress and the Executive Branch under U.S. President Donald Trump. But our wishes were soon dashed when we saw the bill languishing in a Senate Committee.In an AQ article posted on November 28, 2018, we wrote,“Representative Richard Hudson (R-NC) introduced the bill [H.R. 38] on January 3, 2017. The bill passed the House by Roll Call Vote of 231-198, on December 6, 2017. It was sent to the Senate one day later, where it was read twice and then referred to the Senate Judiciary Committee. President Trump supports it. The NRA supports it. And rank and file law enforcement officers support it too. But there has been to date no further action on it. The bill sits in limbo. Its prospect of passage is, at present, low. Why is that?What is the U.S. Senate waiting for?”In answer to our own question, we learned the reason for the wait. Mitch McConnell wanted the bill to die in Committee. And it did die there. McConnell deliberately killed it. We had a window of opportunity. And that window is gone.With fortitude but little fanfare the author of the 2017  “constitutional carry” bill, Richard Hudson reintroduced the bill on January 4, 2021. Nothing came of it.That, incidentally, was sixteen days before the forces that Crush entire Countries placed the irredeemably corrupt and spineless, dementia-riddled, emotional and physical wreck of a man, the Great Betrayer of our Nation, Joe Biden, in the Oval Office. He has all the hallmarks of a useful puppet. He is someone who would obediently serve them, not us, the American people, accountable only to them, and not us. And, so, the puppet masters pushed him on the public and, having manipulated both the public psyche and the electoral process, making sure that he, Joe Biden, and not Donald Trump, would bear and wear the title, “Chief Executive.” The bill went nowhere.  It was referred to the Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security, on March 1, 2021, And there it died.On February 20, 2023, the “constitutional carry bill” was “re-reintroduced,” and, this time, in the Senate. John Cornyn sponsored it. Press coverage of it is sparse, essentially nonexistent. But, a trade group NSSF did reference and commend it. Yet, the bill is a dead letter in a Senate led by New York Democrat Chuck Schumer. In contradistinction to the “Constitutional Carry” bill of 2023, the “AR-15 National Gun” bill has received a lot of Press attention, most of it negative.There is a curious thing about the mechanics of the legislative process concerning that bill, though. The bill’s text has yet to be published. News accounts report this, but none of them hazard a guess as to why there is no accompanying text. Usually, if not invariably, a text immediately accompanies an announcement of a bill. One would expect a text for a bill. Right? Apparently, there wasn't one for H.R. 1095, though. And why might that be? Why would H.R. 1095 be introduced in Congress, sans text? Probably for the reason that there is nothing to be said about it that isn’t in the title of it.Be that as it may, there is nothing in the title that would suggest the bill accomplishes anything. H.R. 1095 is a vacuous exercise in conception, having no purpose other than to rile Anti-Second Amendment members of Congress, the Press, the Biden Administration, Governor Kathy Hochul of New York, and many others that loathe firearms and Americans' exercise of their right to keep and bear them. The bill has no useful purpose that we can see. It is counterproductive, the conception of it shallow and superficial, and the sponsor and co-sponsors of it, callow, thinking they are accomplishing something worthwhile through the presentment of it. They aren't.As explained on the senate.gov website:“Bills deal with domestic and foreign issues and programs, and they also appropriate money to various government agencies and programs.Public bills pertain to matters that affect the general public or classes of citizens, while private bills affect just certain individuals and organizations.”But what does this bill [H.R 1095] do beyond a vacuous declaration, whether true, in some sense, or not, to ascribe to the notion that the “AR-15 is [or should be designated] the National Gun of America?” Nothing positive that we can see. And in the blanket declaration, what does it accomplish? Nothing to strengthen the Second Amendment guarantee if the bill were somehow to become law, and much to harm it. And it is in the harm caused by the mere introduction of it in Congress, that there exists the principal problem with it.As a cursory note, the idea implicit in the bill—the notion of a declaration of a “NATIONAL GUN,” isn’t even original. The sponsor and co-sponsors of it likely didn't even come up with the idea.The sponsor and the co-sponsors of the bill likely didn’t brainstorm this but got the idea after perusing recent issues of the NRA publication, “America’s 1^st Freedom.” We perused those issues too. The idea is prominently displayed on the covers of both the January 2023 and February 2023 magazines.The cover story of the January 2023 issue is “This is My Rifle,” subtitled, “AR-15 is America’s Rifle,” by Serena Juchnowski. The cover story of the February 2023 issue is emblazoned, “America’s Rifle,” and it is subtitled, “What the Gun-Control Crowd Doesn’t Want You To Know About AR-Type Rifles,” by the Constitutional Law expert, and author of several seminal textbooks on the Second Amendment, Stephen P. Halbrook. The articles and Stephen's books are well worth a read.One thing implicit in both articles is the fact that Americans have an unalienable right to keep and bear arms in defense of themselves, close friends, and family, and they have a right to keep and bear arms in defense of the security of a free state, from the tyranny of Government.But, there is nothing in either account of the two lead stories in the NRA that suggests the need for a Statute declaring, or that it would be a good idea to declare, the AR-15 rifle, “the National Gun of the United States.”  The reason why is plain.Americans do not need an Act of Congress to tell them the AR-15 rifle or any other kind of firearm should be designated “THE NATIONAL GUN OF THE UNITED STATES.” Even the construction of the language of the bill is faulty.The use of the phrase “United States” in the bill alludes clearly and unmistakably to the Nation’s “standing army,” not to the civilian citizenry. Of course, the military doesn't use the AR-15 Rifle, anyway. The military versions today are the M4 and M16 assault rifles, which should be available to the sovereign armed citizenry as the final fail-safe against tyranny.And the word ‘Gun’ is a poor choice of terminology as it is a colloquialism and a slang word for ‘Firearm’ or ‘Weapon.’The drafters of the bill would have done better to use language such as, “AR-15 IS THE WEAPON OF CHOICE OF THE AMERICAN CITIZENRY.” This phraseology is preferred as it avoids ambiguity and a negative characterization that the informal verbiage of the actual bill, H.R. 1095 conveys. But this is quibbling. The bill is patently unnecessary at best and, at worse, it weakens the natural law right to armed self-defense that exists intrinsically in man. It isn't the sort of thing that Government bestows on man. Therefore, it isn’t the sort of thing that Government can rescind, or deny to man.The bill was wrong-headed from the get-go, for many reasons. Worse than unnecessary, the mere introduction of it is counterproductive. The passage of it, unlikely though that is, would do nothing to secure our fundamental, unalienable right to armed self-defense were passage of it to occur.We discuss the many serious failings and shortcomings of this bill in the next article.____________________________________Copyright © 2023 Roger J Katz (Towne Criour), Stephen L. D’Andrilli (Publius) All Rights Reserved.  

NEW YORK GOVERNOR KATHY HOCHUL DOESN’T CARE WHAT THE U.S. SUPREME COURT SAYS ABOUT THE STATE'S HANDGUN LICENSING STATUTE

POST BRUEN—WHAT IT ALL MEANS BOTH FOR THOSE WHO SUPPORT THE RIGHT OF THE PEOPLE TO KEEP AND BEAR ARMS AND THOSE WHO SEEK TO UNDERMINE AND EVENTUALLY DESTROY EXERCISE OF THE RIGHT

MULTISERIES

NY GOVERNOR KATHY HOCHUL CONTINUES TO CONSTRAIN THE CIVILIAN CITIZEN'S RIGHT OF ARMED SELF-DEFENSE

PART FIVE

Not content simply to say New York won’t comply with Bruen, the New York Governor’s response to Bruen points to open revolt with the U.S. Supreme Court and the U.S. Constitution.On June 23, 2022, the U.S. Supreme Court officially released its decision in the Bruen case. On that same date a Press Release appeared on New York Governor Kathy Hochul’s website. It says much about her position on civilian citizen possession of handguns in public and what she thinks about the Court and its decision in Bruen. It reads as follows:“Good morning, everyone. We just received some very disturbing news from Washington; that the Supreme Court of the United States of America has stripped away the state of New York's right and responsibility to protect its citizens with a decision—which we are still digesting—which is frightful in its scope of how they are setting back this nation and our ability to protect our citizens back to the days of our founding fathers. And the language we're reading is shocking.As Governor of the State of New York, my number one priority is to keep New Yorkers safe, but today the Supreme Court is sending us backwards in our efforts to protect families and prevent gun violence. And it's particularly painful that this came down at this moment. . . . Today, the Supreme Court struck down a New York law that limits who can carry concealed weapons. Does everyone understand what a concealed weapon means? That you have no forewarning that someone can hide a weapon on them and go into our subways, go into our grocery stores like stores up in Buffalo, New York, where I'm from, go into a school in Parkland or Uvalde.This could place millions of New Yorkers in harm's way. And this is at a time when we're still mourning the loss of lives, as I just mentioned. This decision isn't just reckless, it's reprehensible. It's not what New Yorkers want. We should have the right of determination of what we want to do in terms of our gun laws in our state.If the federal government will not have sweeping laws to protect us, then our states and our governors have a moral responsibility to do what we can and have laws that protect our citizens because of what is going on—the insanity of the gun culture that has now possessed everyone all the way up to even to the Supreme Court.The law we're talking about has been in place since the early 1900s. And now to have our ability to determine who is eligible for a concealed carry permit—this is not an ordinary permit. This is a special use that you can hide it from people. We have limitations, if it's for a proper cause, someone who's been threatened, someone who needs it for their job as a security guard. We have classifications where it is allowed and has been allowed for over a hundred years.”In tone and content Hochul’s message is astonishing. It is a polemic directed at both present and future handgun license holders in New York. But, more than that, it is a presumptuous and dangerous assault on the Third Branch of Government, the U.S. Supreme Court, and on the sanctity and inviolability of the citizen’s natural law right of armed self-defense as codified in the Second Amendment of the Nation’s Bill of Rights.In that Press Release, Hochul says she’s “still digesting” the scope of the decision. But is that true? Hardly. New York had prepared its response to Bruen months ago.Consider——On July 2, 2022, seven days after the release of the decision, and a scant two days after she called for an “extraordinary session of the Legislature in Albany . . . to discuss the impacts of the [Bruen]. . . decision overturning New York State law that previously placed ‘proper cause’ restrictions on the issuance of permits for concealed carry firearms in the state,” Hochul signed into law an extensive and elaborate array of amendments to New York’s handgun licensing statute, including amendments to related statutes, that sailed through the State Legislature in Albany. See article on the jdsupra website.The speed of the process—from drafting of amendments, to their introduction in the State Senate and Assembly, then on to assignment to Committee, Committee markups, then passage of the amendments by both the Senate and the Assembly and the forwarding of the amendments to Governor Kathy Hochul for her signature—all in the space of a week is remarkable—too remarkable to be believed. One must infer that Hochul had notice of the decision well in advance of the official release of the case decision—probably at some point after oral argument that took place in November 2022. The amendments were ready to go upon official release of the Bruen decision. Hochul’s signing off on the amendments was, then, a foregone conclusion. The release of the Bruen decision simply served to trigger enactment of the amendments to New York’s handgun licensing Statute.How bad are these amendments? They are worse than one can imagine. Present holders of valid unrestricted and restricted New York concealed handgun carry licenses will find renewing their licenses difficult. And first-time applicants for concealed handgun carry licenses will find the requirements for issuance of them no less confounding and onerous than before Bruen, and much more vexing.How did New York get to this point? Actually, New York had been moving toward this point for quite some time!The progenitor of New York’s modern handgun licensing regime codified in NY CLS Penal § 400.00 et. seq., that took effect on September 1, 1967, is the Sullivan Dangerous Weapons Act of 1911. It was enacted on August 31, 1911. Handgun carry licensing is not of recent vintage, then. The State has required handgun licensing for close to 112 years, and the State’s desire to keep it is deeply entrenched in the psyche of the Government, and in the psyche of many residents of the State.New York’s handgun license statute—the Sullivan Act that Kathy Hochul refers to in her Press Release—is a reminder to the State, to the Nation, and to the U.S. Supreme Court that the Sullivan Act is here to stay in New York, regardless of anything the U.S. Supreme Court has to say about it. The Sullivan Act has gone through several incarnations since its enactment in 1967—but it always remains true to form—a handgun licensing regime, whose roots are deep and wide. Ostensibly created to deal with incessant crime by constraining the public’s access to handguns, the Sullivan Act failed in that objective, but New York kept it anyway, adding to it through the subsequent years and decades.Indeed, the fairly recent New York Safe Act of 2013 is merely an aspect and extension of it, not distinct from it. And several amendments to the Safe Act have proceeded since—a flurry of them only in the past couple of years. The most recent amendments, springing directly from the Bruen decision, take effect, formally, on Monday September 4, 2022. As the New York State Court of Appeals has explained, the Sullivan Act qua Penal Law § 400.00 “is the exclusive statutory mechanism for the licensing of firearms in New York State. O’Connor v. Scarpino,” 83 N.Y.2d 919, 638 N.E.2d 950 (N.Y. Ct. App. 1994). And that means, for the civilian citizen, there is no way to get around it. Handgun licensing is the foundation of New York’s assault on the Second Amendment and that of many other jurisdictions as well.New York’s handgun license statute has gone through several iterations since its enactment in 1967. But the most recent amendments to it, coming on the heels of Bruen, will take effect on September 4, 2022. Section 400.00 plus the Post-Bruen Amendments IS the Sullivan Act brought into the 21^st Century.Back then as now, New York, and other jurisdictions, including California and Illinois, rationalized civilian arms control as necessary to promote “public safety.” And Governor Hochul’s Press Release echoes that sentiment that hearkens back to the turn of the 20^th Century, even as the crime rate in New York in the 21^st Century continues to soar. Continued constraints on civilian access to firearms in defiance of the Second Amendment has become an end in itself although Anti-Second Amendment proponents will rarely, if ever, say that and as many in Government will readily deny it even as they push for further constraints on the exercise of it.“As the California Supreme Court ruled in People v. Camperlingo (69 Cal. 466 [1924]), ‘It is clear that, in the exercise of the police power of the state, that is, for public safety or the public welfare generally, such right [to bear arms] may be either regulated or, in proper cases, entirely destroyed.’ The Illinois Supreme Court ruled in Biffer v. City of Chicago (278 Ill. 562 [1917]) that ‘the sale of deadly weapons may be absolutely prohibited.’” “Firearms Regulation: A Historical Overview,” 28 Crime & Just. 137, by Michael A. Bellesiles, Professor of History, Emory University. The New York Governor, Kathy Hochul, and the State Legislature, and the State and Federal District and U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals are all onboard with this. The average civilian citizen resident of New York has wide chasm to cross to obtain the coveted prize of an unrestricted concealed handgun carry license. And that chasm has just become wider.___________________________________

“PUBLIC SAFETY” IS A RUSE TO GET NEW YORKERS ON BOARD WITH FURTHER RESTRICTIONS TO THE LICENSING STATUTE

PART SIX

The lure of “public safety” explains the Sullivan Act’s longevity. Anti-Second Amendment jurisdictions refer to it often. Yet, to what extent Governor Kathy Hochul and the Legislature can honestly be said to believe that stringent curbs to civilian citizen possession of firearms does truly promote public safety—given the horrific upward spiral of violent crime in New York, predominantly in New York City, is open to conjecture. But the fact many New Yorkers believe that keeping handguns out of the hands of average, law-abiding, and responsible civilian citizens does contain violent crime, is apparently enough for both the Governor and for the State Legislature in Albany to continue to promote further and severe constraints on civilian citizen armed self-defense. If “Public safety”—whether clever, deceptive Government ruse or honest, albeit erroneous, Government belief—serves as the raison d’être for the handgun licensing regime, then application of “proper cause” is the mechanism that serves to constrain the average, rational, responsible, law-abiding civilian citizen from lawfully possessing a handgun in the public sphere. Armed self-defense thus remains a privilege in New York, notwithstanding the language of the Second Amendment that professes to express armed self-defense as a fundamental, unalienable right of the people.New Yorkers can change handgun carry laws in New York. And it is a simple process to do so as long as the public has the will to do so: simply vote Governor Hochul and those Legislators who hold the same views as she does toward handgun licensing in New York, out-of-office. New Yorkers have an opportunity to do so this November 2022.If New Yorkers demur, then they will continue to suffer. Violent crime will continue to rise, and innocent people will continue to die.A leap of faith is required here. It shouldn’t be difficult, given the irrationality of restrictive gun measures that simply target the law-abiding citizen, and not the criminal. But strong beliefs, even irrational ones die hard.

NEW YORK GOVERNOR KATHY HOCHUL DOESN’T GIVE A DAMN WHAT THE U.S. SUPREME COURT SAYS ABOUT NEW YORK’S HANDGUN CARRY LAW, SHE PRESUMES TO KNOW BETTER THAN THE COURT.

It is one thing for a Government to rely on an erroneous belief as justification for infringing a fundamental, unalienable, immutable, eternal natural law right of the American people. It is quite another thing to brashly defy the U.S. Constitution and the U.S. Supreme Court, substituting one’s own judgment, and normative beliefs, and personal political and social philosophy, for that of the precepts and stricture of the U.S. Constitution.The U.S. Constitution, as promulgated by men much wiser than Governor Hochul and Anti-Second Amendment Legislators in Albany has, through the test of time, proved its value. This Country, in the space of almost 250 years, has outstripped any other modern Nation, becoming by far the wealthiest, most powerful, most prosperous, any Nation on Earth. The U.S. Constitution, grounded on the precepts of Individualism has enabled this. It is no accident.The prescription for the Nation’s success is simple: Government exists to serve the interests of the American people, and they, not Government, are sovereign over Government and over their own destiny.Indeed, the tacit theme of all three seminal Second Amendment cases—Heller, McDonald, and Bruen—is that Government must pay homage to the natural law rights of man.But Governor Hochul and the New York State Legislature will have none of that just that. The forces they represent and pay homage to have other plans for Americans. There is no limit to their disdain for the Constitution, their rudeness toward the U.S. Supreme Court, and their contempt for the American people.Through tortuous, guileful legislative legerdemain, the New York Government has enacted an elaborate set of amendments to the State’s handgun licensing Statute, Section 400.00, and to the concealed handgun carry Section of the Statute, especially, NY CLS Penal § 400.00(2)(f).  These amendments serve merely as a pretense of compliance with Bruen, and a poor one at that.But they don’t fool anyone, especially the Court. On inspection, the State’s “Post-Bruen” Amendments to Section 400.00 are excessively harsh, brutal really.   To understand how that is, it helps to understand what the New York handgun licensing Statute looked like prior to Bruen. We delve into that and compare and contrast the original Section 400.00 handgun licensing Statute with the amendments to it in the next article.

NEW YORK’S HANDGUN LICENSE STATUTE PRIOR TO BRUEN IS BAD; AFTER BRUEN IT IS WORSE

In the most recent iteration, prior to Bruen, applicants for any New York handgun license—whether restricted or not—had to comply with Section 400.00(a), which denies possession of a handgun to anyone who is under disability as defined in Federal Statute, 18 U.S.C § 922.  New York has adopted that Statute for its own use. Up till now, to obtain a concealed handgun carry license, applicants in the general population had to demonstrate “proper cause,” set forth in, but never defined in, Penal Code Section 400.00(a).The State Legislature has left it up to the licensing authorities of the Counties to specify “proper cause,” and what that is has remained quite nebulous. The whole point of this is to make it difficult for the average person to acquire a carry license. So, few have tried, and most that have tried have failed secured such licenses. Under the New York Constitution’s Home Rule provision, though, New York City is permitted to adopt its own “proper cause” requirements for applicants of concealed handgun carry licenses, and it has done so. These are set forth in 38 RCNY 5-03. They are stringent, but, at least, not inherently nebulous.Individuals who presently hold valid concealed handgun carry licenses in the City, which NYPD License Division has exclusive authority to issue, have, through time, adapted to the NYPD License Division’s “proper cause” requirements. These requirements are aimed at providing a mechanism for the City’s entrepreneurial class to obtain licenses.It suggests an explicit attempt at accommodation of business practices—operating as both cause and effect. The NYPD License Division establishes the requirements for business entrepreneurs to qualify for a concealed handgun carry license, and those entrepreneurs do their best to comply with those requirements. Compliance with those requirements have thus enabled a small number of people, New York City’s entrepreneurial class that happens to handle substantial amounts of cash in the usual course of their business, to obtain a coveted handgun carry license. The NYPD License Division establishes the criteria under which applicants for handgun carry licenses can satisfy requirements, and those business applicants oblige the NYPD. So, it has been for decades. That now goes out the door.Under the requirements for a concealed handgun carry license in New York City and in the rest of the State—that take effect in September—the City’s Rules will not be valid. Be that as it may, at present, the NYPD License Division has yet to revise its Rules for issuance of concealed handgun licenses. But the Division will have to. The City’s Home Rule Charter gives the NYPD License Division substantial leeway to establish its “proper cause” criteria, but the City’s criteria have to be consistent with the intent of the Statute. The present rules are not consistent with the amendments to Section 400.00 that take effect in September.Those entrepreneurs who have business establishments in the City and who have adapted their business procedures to cohere to the NYPD License Divisions procedure will find their pro forma renewal process no longer open to them. They are in jeopardy of losing acquisition of concealed handgun carry licenses that heretofore they could rely on as long as their business operations and practices remained consistent through time. Upon renewal of their present license, they must comply with the new requirements or forsake their concealed handgun carry license. We investigate those in the next article, Part Seven of this series._____________________________________Copyright © 2022 Roger J Katz (Towne Criour), Stephen L. D’Andrilli (Publius) All Rights Reserved.

“THE PRIVILEGE” TO KEEP AND BEAR ARMS SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED?

“THE PRIVILEGE” TO KEEP AND BEAR ARMS SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED?

QUOTATION LEAD-IN TO ARTICLE

“It is time for us to think outside the box and form two countries. Instead of civil war I propose civil separation. We are two countries, so ideologically opposed that each feels victimized and dominated by the other. Political leaders need to step up and brainstorm next steps. Clearly lay out the two ideologies and give each state a vote as to where they belong.” ~“Opinion Letter” from reader of The New York Times posted on June 5, 2022, responding to May 27, 2022 “America May Be Broken Beyond Repair,” by the Political Progressive Columnist for the Times, Michelle Goldberg. The letter writer, Dawn Menken, a Psychologist, from Portland, Oregon, is the author of “Facilitating a More Perfect Union: A Guide for Politicians and Leaders,” published in 2021*

THE CONCEPT OF ‘PRIVILEGE’ ISN'T AT ALL THE SAME THING AS AN ‘UNMODIFIABLE, FUNDAMENTAL, IMMUTABLE, ILLIMITABLE, AND ETERNAL GOD-BESTOWED RIGHT’, BUT THE TWO CONCEPTS ARE OFTEN, AND ERRONEOUSLY, CONFLATED

If the American public didn’t know the truth before, it knows it now: the battle for the very Soul of the Country is on the line, and Ground Zero of that battle isn’t Uvalde, Texas. It’s New York City, New York.The Nation is indeed “two Countries,”—no less so now than at the time of the American Civil War: friend against friend, brother against brother, uncle against cousin, father against son. But, what is different today is that ideologies cut across and into the very notion of what it means to be an American. There are those who hold to the meaning and purport of our Nation as set forth in our Constitution and especially in the Nation's Bill of Rights. And there are those who wish to jettison all of it in the erroneous belief that our Nation is at its core,  immoral, even evil. They wish to destroy the very fabric of a free Constitutional Republic. These adherents of the ideology of Collectivism have, with the aid of nefarious and shadowy and powerful forces, residing both here and abroad, gained control over much of the Federal Government. And having gained control over much of the Press and of media, as well, they propagate their message to the American people incessantly and vehemently. But one thing these Collectivist overseers have not gained control over: America's armed citizenry. And that disturbs and perplexes them and places them in a quandary as to what to do about it. For doing something about that, these Collectivists must. One cannot destroy a Nation if one cannot gain control over those who have the will and means to effectively resist the insinuation of tyranny over them.But, how does one go about separating an estimated 400 million firearms (according to American Gun Facts) in the hands of one-third of the target population. According to a November 2020 Gallop Poll, thirty-two percent of Americans possess firearms. See also report of the Rand Corporation, a 2017 report of the Pew Research Center, titled, “the Demographics of gun ownership,” and an SSRN 2021 “National Firearms Survey.” Seditious newspapers, like the Washington Post, New York Times, Los Angeles Times, and USA Today, and seditious Cable and Broadcast news organizations, including ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN, MSNBC, PBS, and NPR disparage guns and gun ownership so frequently and so vehemently that a person is led to infer that their business models are designed around that one narrative. The amount of air time and Press coverage these news organizations devote to defensive use of arms is so scarce as to be essentially nonexistent. Such mention that is made of effective defensive use of arms to thwart criminal because of too much internet chatter regarding it, is given curt treatment with the hope that it will eventually dissipate on its own. Instead the American psyche is bombarded with viral memes. Injected with and subjected to verbal and visual memes on a daily basis, the American develops a phobic reaction toward guns and toward those who possess them: word phrases such as Gun Violence, Gun Culture, Mass Shootings, Assault Weapons, AR-15 Rifles, Weapons of War, Large Capacity Magazines, when coupled with images of violence operate as visual and auditory cues, that induce a neurotic reaction in the target population. This is to be expected; in fact this is intended. The goal is to create in the mind of the target a feeling of physical revulsion and repulsion toward guns.But, is it really a concern over the safety of innocent people that motivates a vigorous response against firearms and firearms' ownership, misguided though that be, or is there something more sinister at play? If it were the former, one would expect a harsh response toward the massive wave of everyday criminal violence infecting our Country, especially in the major urban areas. But, we see no such response. Those State and municipal Government officials and legislators who rabidly attack guns in the hands of average, rational, responsible, individuals handle rampant violent and vicious crime infecting their locales with an air of casual indifference and diffidence. So, it cannot be violent crime generally or violent gun crime committed by drug-crazed lunatics, psychopathic and psychotic gangbangers, and by garden-variety criminals that motivate these officials. What might it be, then? Why would Neo-Marxist/Neoliberal Globalist Government officials, along with their compatriots in the Press, go off half-cocked whenever a rare occurrence, invariably avoidable, of "mass violence" arises, occasioned by the actions of a solitary lunatic? Why would Government officials and legislators shriek for more nonsensical gun laws, targeting tens of millions of average Americans, predicating the need for it on the lowest common denominator among us: the lone wolf psychotic. The answer is plain. The actions of the lone wolf psychotic merely provide a convenient pretext. It isn't the criminal actions of the lone wolf malcontent psychotic that Government is concerned about. For that lone wolf doesn't pose a viable threat to a Government. Rather, it is the armed citizenry that poses a threat to Government and by the very fact that the citizenry is armed. But, why should Government fear its own citizenry? It shouldn't and wouldn't unless Government seeks to usurp the sovereignty of the citizenry, as it clearly aims to do.A perspicacious Tyrant would know it is a Tyrant. But this Federal Government doesn't know it. So entrenched in Tyranny is this Federal Government through years and decades of usurpation of the authority rightfully belonging to the American people, that it has grown oblivious to its unlawful usurpation of power and authority. The Federal Government has amassed power and authority that doesn't belong to it, and never did belong to it, believing, wrongly, that the power it has usurped from the people is rightfully its own. And the Government has become jealous in guarding this power, hoarding it all for itself.It then stands to reason that the Federal Government would come to perceive the armed citizenry as a potential rival to crush, rather than as a master to serve. But, even in that the Federal Government, as Tyrant, is really but a caretaker to those bankers and financiers who are plotting the demise of this western Nation-State and all western Nation-States.Americans celebrate July 4 every year, since July 4, 1776, the Day America's first  Patriots declared their independence from tyranny. The Declaration of Independence was a righteous but defiant act. It led to war. It was a war hard fought. And the seeming underdog vanquished the mighty British empire. July 4, 2022, is just around the corner. But every year, since the turn of the 21st Century, Americans have had cause for concern, whether this July 4th Celebration would be our Nation's last.The founders created a Republican form of Government, having considered and dismissed many others. the American people would themselves be sovereign rulers where their representatives would serve and represent their interests. A Republican form of Government as envisioned and as created is antithetical to a Dictatorship, where Government is sovereign over the people.The British monarchy would eventually come to terms with loss of the American colonies. The Rothschild clan, on the other hand, would not forgive nor forget the loss of those colonies, and the loss of financial riches across the Atlantic Ocean. With the help of other financiers they realized it best to use subterfuge rather than arms to defeat the colonialists descendants. With the creation of the Federal Reserve System and with the seeding of money to the representatives of the people, to do their bidding and not that of the American people, and with their control over vast levers of power of Government, and with their control of the Press—the mechanism of dissemination of information—the Rothschild clan and its captain have gained back in two hundred and fifty years all that they had lost in eight years of the American Revolutionary War—but for one thing:

UNLIKE THE PEOPLE OF THE EUROPEAN UNION AND OF THE BRITISH COMMONWEALTH NATIONS, THE AMERICAN PEOPLE ARE AN ARMED PEOPLE

A Tyrannical Caretaker Government for the Rothschild and Soros Financiers and Globalist Billionaire elites cannot gain control over a citizenry that has the requisite will and the means to effectively resist oppression and subjugation.Americans are well aware that the loss of their Republic, their Sovereignty, of their God-Given Rights and Liberties is at hand—but for the fact that Americans are armed.The senile, corrupt, weak-willed, and weak-kneed puppet of the Globalist elites, signed a flurry of executive orders on a wide variety of matters, rescinding and countermanding the gains made by Donald Trump in returning our Nation to prosperity and prominence on the world stage. But, the policy-makers wisely refrained from taking any action, curtailing the right of the people to keep and bear arms. The puppet masters knew that they would need time to consolidate their power even with the feeble, frail Biden puppet and legions of other lackeys at their disposal. And time they now had with Trump removed from Office. And they knew that it would be just a matter of time before some lunatic with a gun would create a furor that the Press could pounce upon. Perhaps, they even had a hand in prepping their psychotic robots to instigate the events that would serve as the quasi-plausible pretexts upon which to launch a flurry of new anti-gun legislation.All of this would be necessary. A new soci0-political-economic paradigm embracing the entire world is an ambitious project. And the remains of the United States is a vital component for bringing that project to fruition. Pragmatic concerns mandate this. But emotions probably also play a part. The Rothschild clan could see, not only in the demise of the United States, but in the manner of that demise—Americans denigrating their own history and heritage, destroying their own monuments, disparaging their own Founders—a malicious joy in that undertaking would be something the Rothschild clan and George Soros et. al. would chuckle over.The nascent American people effectively resisted tyranny once before, long ago, against immense odds, and overthrew a tyrannical Government, the British Empire. That empire was nominally ruled by a Monarch, George III. But it was  effectively ruled by the Rothschild Banking Cartel.George III was long laid to rest. The present British Dynasty, the House of Windsor, is decadent, effete, corrupt, and a major expense to the English people. Once Queen Elizabeth dies, the monarchy will quickly wither under King Charles if he becomes King at all. The English Parliament, like the monarchy operates more by empty ritual. The real power resides in the Bank of England, just as the Federal Reserve presides over the Government of the United States.The United States Supreme Court will soon release its decision in Bruen, and the puppet masters and their minions in the Press and in Government are worried; frantic, really. What claim can they make on the Nation if sovereignty over it continues to rest, not in them, but in the American people?Much more concerning to the Nation’s Destructors than a High Court decision in the Dobbs abortion case—a leaked version of which created a furor as it was designed to do—is retention by the Right of the People to Keep and Bear Arms. Unrestrained exercise of this Fundamental God-Given Right by the people goes to the heart of our Nation’s history, heritage, traditions, ethos, culture, and ethical and legal foundation.The Nation’s enemies, both inside it and outside it, detest America’s armed citizenry. They hate the Nation’s freedoms and liberties. They disdain the Nation’s belief and faith in Divine Natural Law.That abhorrence isn’t grounded on mere aesthetics or even on ethical concerns. It is based on frustration, rage, and fear. The Bill of Rights prevents America’s domestic and foreign enemies from taking control over the Nation and its people.In colorful language, The NYTimes explains this frustration, rage, and fear—one borne of Americans’ insistent adoration for its Bill of Rights. The Times says:“Most Republicans in the Senate represent deeply conservative states where gun ownership is treated as a sacred privilege enshrined in the Constitution, a privilege not to be infringed upon no matter how much blood is spilled in classrooms and school hallways around the country.” ~ from an article in The New York Times, May 26, 2022, by Carl Hulse, Chief D.C. correspondent for the NYTimes.That aforementioned article came out in late May. Two weeks later, ten U.S. Republican Senators, “Ten Little Indians”,** broke ranks. They betrayed their Oath to their Constituents. That was bad enough. But, they also betrayed their Oath to Country and to Constitution. That was worst of all. For, in doing so, they betrayed their Faith and Allegiance in the Divine Creator in daring to circumvent Divine Will. They have joined the ranks of the Democrat Party Neo-Marxist/Neoliberal Globalist Satanists. These “Ten Little Indians”—these ignominious United States Republican Party Senators, ten in number—should, properly, justifiably, suffer the fate of those “Ten Little Indians” of poem.The Hill reports, “A bipartisan group of senators announced a deal Sunday on framework legislation to address a recent surge in gun violence in the U.S.The proposed legislation includes funding for school safety resources, strengthened background checks for buyers under the age of 21, incentives for states to implement their own red flag laws, penalties for straw purchases of firearms and increased protections for domestic violence victims.The bipartisan group was made up of 20 senators, including 10 GOP lawmakers, many of whom are strong supporters of gun rights and political allies of the powerful National Rifle Association (NRA).”With support from those 10 Republicans, the legislation likely has the votes to overcome the 60-vote threshold to avoid a filibuster in the Senate. And what caused these 10 Republicans to take affirmative action against preservation of an absolute and essential fundamental Right—the Natural Law Right of Armed Self-Defense? What caused these Republicans to capitulate to the Neo-Marxist Democrats: Bribes of Money? Desire to appease an angry mob of Neo-Marxist Cultist lunatics? Fear of physical assault from this angry mob of Neo-Marxist Cultist fanatics and lunatics if these Republicans failed to bow down to the mob and to a renegade Neo-Marxist/Neoliberal Globalist-controlled Congress and to the powerful and ruthless forces that control them both? Or, were they of that mindset all along:The Destroyers of our Nation don’t even deign to refer to gun possession as a Basic Right—the most basic Right: one grounded on personal survival, be it from predatory creature, predatory man, or predatory Government. Rather they utilize the word, ‘privilege,’ in lieu of ‘right,’ to describe those who seek to exercise it. Tacit in the word, ‘privilege,’ is the idea of something wonderful that some people attain by dint of birth advantage or connection made or acquired—but that most do not.This substitution of words is no small thing. To be sure, the words, ‘right’ and ‘privilege,’ are often conflated. For example, in the Merriam-Webster dictionary——“A privilege is a right or advantage gained by birth, social position, effort, or concession.” Yet, a “Right’, i.e., a “Fundamental God-Bestowed Right” is something beyond mere “Privilege.” It is a thing intrinsic to a person—derived from natural law. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy elaborates on this:

• “To have a right is to have a ‘valid claim.’”
• “‘In the strictest sense’ all rights are claims.”  
• “A right, in the most important sense, is the conjunction of a [privilege] and a claim-right.”
• “All rights are essentially property rights.”
• “Rights are themselves property, things we own.”

This distinction between ‘fundamental right’ and ‘privilege’ rests at the root of  Bruen, whether one knows this or not, and therein rests its singular importance for Americans.And the Bruen case is more important to the preservation of a free Republic than many Americans can truly appreciate or the legacy Press and Government will let on.In its Brief for review, on December 17, 2020, the Petitioner presented the issue thus:“Whether the Second Amendment allows the government to prohibit ordinary law-abiding citizens from carrying handguns outside the home for self-defense.”The issue as stated goes to the heart of the import of the Second Amendment. Do Americans have a fundamental, unalienable right to keep and bear arms, or not? Petitioners meant to bring that salient issue front and center. Heller made clear that a person has the unalienable right to keep and bear arms in defense of hearth and home. But, the underlying basis for that ruling and the substructure of it is this: the right of the people to keep and bear arms is an individual right. The tacit implication is this: exercise of that right is grounded on natural law, and beyond the power of the State to meddle in it, i.e., the Right of the People to Keep and Bear Arms is God-bestowed, and, therefore, Absolute.In an attempt to lessen the impact of a ruling expected to favor the Petitioner, the Robert’s Court limited the scope of the issue on review to consideration of the Constitutionality of the City’s procedures for issuing concealed handgun carry licenses. The High Court redrafted the issue on review to this:“Whether the state of New York's denial of petitioners' applications for concealed-carry licenses for self-defense violated the Second Amendment.”John Roberts and the liberal wing of the Court attempted to chop off the legs of the issue at the knee: reducing the reviewable issue merely to the constitutionality of  NYPD procedures.In light of the recent Uvalde, Texas incident, an incident that the Harris-Biden Administration, along with a Democrat-Marxist-controlled Congress and seditious Press, has irresponsibly, reprehensibly, unconscionably, shamelessly and incessantly focused the public's attention on and magnified to further its goal—the eradication of the Nation's Second Amendment of the Bill of Rights and the toppling of a free Constitutional Republic—the Bruen case takes on heightened importance. This Neo-Marxist/Neoliberal Globalist abhorrence of the armed citizenry is borne of outright fear. The Tyrant always hates and fears an armed citizenry. But, what might Americans expect from the High Court apropos of Bruen.In a worst-case scenario for the puppet masters and their minions who seek the dismantling of our free Republic, the Court will strike down the entire handgun licensing regime. If that were to happen, the impact would be felt across the Nation.Americans would immediately commence filing lawsuits challenging restrictive concealed handgun licensing regimes across the Nation, as well they should.The Bruen case was/is primed to do just that. And, after more than a decade— and with Marxist/Globalist Government's continuing consolidation of power, methodically and inexorably stripping the citizenry of its Fundamental Rights and of its sovereignty over Government—it is high time for another seminal Second Amendment case. Only through the preservation of the armed citizenry can America's Patriots ever hope to preserve the Founders hard-fought victory over oppression and Tyranny. Only through steadfast defense of the meaning, and purpose, and  the American Revolution of 1776, can Americans effectively repulse the Neo-Marxist/Neoliberal Globalist Open Society/EU/UN/New World Order Collectivist Counterrevolution of the 21st Century.___________________________________

DON’T RELY ON THE U.S. SUPREME COURT TO PROTECT THE SECOND AMENDMENT.

THE FORTHCOMING BRUEN DECISION IS LIKELY TO BE MORE DISAPPOINTMENT THAN JOY—JUST LIKE THE NEW YORK CITY GUN TRANSPORT CASE DECISION THAT CAME BEFORE IT.

Even the most politically naïve of Americans and even the most devout of the Democrat Party faithful must now have serious misgivings about the future well-being of our Nation. They must now recognize that the Federal Government—after Trump—is not what they counted. It is not what they bargained for. They must now recognize that the Federal Government—this Federal Government—does not serve their interests and that it does not have their life, safety, and well-being at heart: quite the opposite in fact. The Executive Branch and the Democrat-Party-controlled Congress are two institutions serving the interests of the lunatic fringe Neo-Marxist Cultists and Neoliberal Globalist Billionaire Bilderberg Group Clubbists, only.The shared aspiration of both is to witness the demise of the United States as an independent sovereign nation-state; the destruction of a free Constitutional Republic; the annihilation of a once proud and sovereign American people and their concomitant debasement and devolution to subjugation, and servitude. And all that is occurring swiftly.Nor should Americans pin their hopes on the High Court—the Third Branch of the Federal Government—to save them from the mess deliberately propagated by the first two. If Americans believe that the U.S. Supreme Court will surely preserve and protect the Constitution and staunchly defend their Bill of Rights, they will surely be sorely disappointed.If the New York City gun transport case is a harbinger of things to come from the rulings in Bruen, then Bruen is likely to be a hollow victory at best. Less a third seminal Second Amendment case building on Heller and McDonald, Bruen is likely to read more like the Roe v Wade abortion case—a sorry attempt to satisfy everyone, it will likely do little to satisfy anyone. And, why do we say this:First and Foremost, Consider——The Roberts Court's reconfiguration of the issue in Bruen was meant to forestall  a cataclysmic ruling that would put a stop to the very notion of open-ended “gun regulations”—the bane of the Second Amendment—that would serve to buttress and strengthen the Heller and McDonald rulings. Chief Justice Roberts and the liberal wing of the High Court wanted none of that. And the restructuring of the  issue in Bruen was meant to guarantee that noxious, heavy-handed and clearly unconstitutional handgun licensing schemes, would be here to stay, at least in some jurisdictions. Thus, it behooves the American Patriot, to be wary of High Court meddling, no less so than Executive and Legislative Branch meddling in the matter of fundamental, immutable, absolute—yes, absolute—Rights. The Third Branch of the Federal Government—this Roberts Court, sans Scalia— no less than the first two Branches, will not zealously defend the Bill of Rights, and especially the Second Amendment right of the people to keep and bear arms, notwithstanding the integrity and fortitude and intellectual  acumen of Justices Thomas and Alito. For they are only two stalwart American Patriots remaining now that Justice Scalia is no longer with us. But, then, the Framers of our Constitution, with Divine guidance, did intend and did provide, through inclusion of God-Given Absolute Rights, existent inherently in man, that the American citizenry would be wanting if bereft of support from any one or more or all three of the three Branches of the Federal Government. The American people require not assistance in defense of the Nation's elemental Rights and Liberties, for the Federal Government cannot excise them away. The Executive Branch cannot issue Presidential edicts or Bureaucratic Rules to blunt the exercise of them. The Legislative Branch cannot enact laws to nullify them. And the Judicial Branch cannot issue opinions to deny their import. All attempts to modify, repeal, abrogate, dismiss, ignore, or reinterpret God-Given Rights by Governmental artifice is unlawful from the get-go. The plain, succinct, categorical language of the sacred Rights of the Bill of Rights of the United States Constitution makes transparent, the immutable, illimitable, eternal, non-modifiable, absolute nature of them and demonstrates the irrationality and incongruity of any attempt by the Government or by its proxies to diminish them.But, then, should Americans ever have placed faith in this Federal Government, above their faith in Divine Natural Law. Of course not! Does not this Federal Government, not unlike any other Government in history, have, within it, the seeds of repression, oppression—in a word, 'tyranny'? Assuredly so!Truly, to defend Liberty, Freedom, and Sovereignty, the onus will always rest, as it has in the beginning, and as it must in the end—on the people themselves— to defend their Liberty, Freedom, and sovereignty against all threats whether emanating outside the Country or writhing within its very bowels.Thus, Americans should not place, their hopes and dreams in the High Court as their main, much less their sole, source of and mechanism for their salvation. That Branch of Government, as with the other two, is ultimately a "political organization," as unreliable and as conniving as the other two. Sure, Justices Thomas and Alito are known quantities: men of unparalleled principle and ethics. But, only the late Justice Scalia had sufficient, formidable strength— capable of standing up to Chief Justice Roberts; keeping both Roberts and the liberal wing of the Court in check.But the eminent Justice Antonin Scalia is, unfortunately, no longer with us. He died under mysterious circumstances: circumstances never resolved, events not adequately explained; circumstances unlikely ever to be resolved or adequately explained to the public's satisfaction.So then, what will Americans likely see from the upcoming Bruen decision? The U.S. Supreme Court will strike down New York City’s procedures for issuing concealed handgun carry licenses, and it may do so on grounds of vagueness or arbitrariness; but that will still leave the heart of “may-issue”/“proper cause” in force. Stephen Breyer and the other liberal wing Associate Justices will file their lengthy and vehement dissents. And Associate Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito—with Amy Coney-Barrett, perhaps—will probably file concurring opinions. And, if so, they will likely point to, explicate, and expound upon the illegal and illogical “may-issue”/“proper cause” construct. But the concurrences as with the dissents will be dicta only. They will not have the force of law, i.e., they will not operate as binding holdings/rulings.The case holdings/rulings will, then, likely come up short. Given a reworking by the Roberts Court of the issue, as presented in Petitioners' Brief, it is unlikely  the Conservative Court majority will be able to strike down the entirety of concealed handgun licensing structure of New York even if Justices Thomas and Alito would be willing and prepared to do just that. For, if that were to happen, it would implicate and therefore jeopardize similar handgun licensing regimes in other Anti-Second Amendment jurisdictions. Justice Roberts and the liberal wing would never allow that to happen. And Justice Scalia isn't here to see that it would happen.See, e.g., article in Syracuse News, where one New York  District County attorney predicts that the Court's ruling in Bruen will be very narrow.

“Locally, law enforcement officials don’t expect the decision will affect the policing of guns or safety.

'I think (the court is) going to take the narrowest route possible' said Onondaga County District Attorney William Fitzpatrick.”

Strong concurrences by Justices and Alito and Thomas would only operate as dicta, not actionable case rulings/holdings. Thus, a minimalist Bruen decision would hearken back to the limp and lame New York City handgun transport case. That would be a blow to the sanctity and inviolability of the right of the people to keep and bear arms.  The validity of New York's concealed handgun licensing regime, along with the underlying methodology/paradigm model of “may-issue”/“proper cause” will remain intact. But that is what we will see. The Arbalest Quarrel hopes we are wrong in our estimates. We would be surprised but pleased if that were to happen, but we don't expect that it will.A minimalist High Court ruling in Bruen would also disparage the import of the Court’s rulings in Heller and McDonald. The Nation’s enemies would be pleased. America's Patriots, rightfully, would not.Such a paltry ruling would not bode well for the continued security of a free State, especially in the present unhealthy political, social, and economic climate.But, even a minimalist ruling favoring the Bruen Petitioners will not be good enough for Anti-Second Amendment news organizations such as CBS News, whose doom and gloom prognostications only see the upending of the entire New York State concealed handgun licensing regime:“The Supreme Court is on the verge of ruling on a case that could overturn New York state's gun carry law. Records obtained by CBS2 show as many as 20,000 more guns could inundate the streets of the Big Apple, following such a decision.”That isn't likely to happen even on a best case ruling scenario. For, contrary to this reporting, the constitutionality of the entire New York State concealed handgun carry regime isn't at issue. The issue on review goes to the procedures created by the NYPD Licensing Division. Chief Justice Roberts saw to that. So, we know where his sentiments rest, even if, as a matter of logic alone, and not law, the Constitutionality of the entire New York handgun licensing regime is impacted. As we expect, the underlying handgun licensing structure will remain unscathed, consistent with the restrictions made by the Roberts Court on the issue to be decided in Bruen.Suppose, then, that consistent with the constrained issue, the Court's majority does strike down the City's concealed handgun carry license procedures, only, leaving intact the salient structure of the State's handgun licensing regime. That won't do much for Petitioners' rights; at least not immediately, and, perhaps, not ever.New York State and New York City will take their good time in developing and  instituting new concealed handgun carry license procedures for issuance of unrestricted and restricted handgun carry licenses both in the City and across the State.CBS News, of course, sees a slow-walk as a good thing, as they assert in the afore-referenced article:“. . . a high-ranking source tells CBS2's Marcia Kramer it could take the city years to comply.”See also articles in other Anti-Second Amendment sources such as Gothamist and in the seditious CNN and NY Times.And the New York Government would take its own good time in concocting a new set of arbitrary procedures to replace the ones struck down. New Yorkers would then be back to square one. America’s enemies would breathe a collective sigh of relief. There is no doubt about that! The NY Times reported on June 6, 2022, the following:“In New York, Gov. Kathy Hochul has said that she would consider calling a special session of the State Legislature if the law were overturned. And after a shooting in Buffalo last month in which a teenager motivated by racism killed 10 Black people at a grocery store, she brought up the law unprompted, saying that her administration was ‘preparing our state for what could be a Supreme Court decision that allows people to carry concealed weapons. We’re ready.’A spokeswoman for the governor declined to elaborate further on the preparations.”One need not wonder of the impact the Uvalde, Texas Elementary School shooting incident will have on Hochul. She will only become more entrenched in slow-walking or sabotaging, outright, a Bruen High Court decision that strikes down the New York City' Police Department License Division's procedures for issuing concealed handgun licenses.More importantly is the question what impact the recent shooting incident will have on the U.S. Supreme Court itself. Has the Court made changes to the majority, and concurring, and dissenting opinions, as a result of that incident in light of immense news coverage of it and Congressional action on it?Americans will no doubt see the liberal-wing in rare form, writing political and public policy tracts disguised as legal opinions. And, don't be surprised to see Chief Justice Roberts doing the same. The danger here is that Roberts and Kavanaugh may, at the Eleventh Hour, do a one-eighty switcheroo and join the liberal wing of the Court. That would give the liberal wing of the Court the majority it needs to rule for the Respondent New York, against the Petitioners. New York’s unelected Governor, Kathy Hochul, true to form—hateful of the Second Amendment—is going ahead full throttle to destroy the Right of the people to keep and bear arms as if Bruen never existed, even though a decision in the case is imminent. She has made this patently clear in a flurry of Anti-Second Amendment legislation she has very recently signed, as well as in her executive orders.And the New York City Mayor, Eric Adams, is 100% onboard with Hochul, as he backs her continuing control of the State. An affiliate of NBC News, 4NewYork News, reports:“New York City Mayor Eric Adams endorsed New York Gov. Kathy Hochul for a full term on Wednesday, praising her as 'an amazing governor' who deserves a full term.Adams, a centrist Democrat like Hochul, told supporters at a Manhattan union hall that voters need someone who can 'get stuff done in the state of New York.' Hochul, the former lieutenant governor, is running to keep the job she has held since August 2021 when Andrew Cuomo resigned amid allegations of sexual harassment, which he has denied.”The Neo-Marxist/Neoliberal Globalist-controlled Federal Government and the Soros backed and funded Neo-Marxist/Neoliberal Globalist State and Municipal Governments across the Country do nothing to hide their visceral contempt for the American people or their outright loathing of the Bill of Rights. One sees all of this through their failure to comply with the strictures of this Nation's body of laws and its Constitution. Worse, one sees increasing intimations of brazen seditious meddling with and offending of Bill of Rights imperatives. Nothing  constrains the actions of the Collectivists' insinuation of tyranny throughout the Republic, much as they, together with CCP China, consolidate their control over the nation-states of the EU and over the British Commonwealth Nations.Still, the United States has one thing no other Nation or group of Nations or other political construct has: a true Bill of Rights that incorporates the preeminent Right: that of Armed Self-Defense. But, how many firearms are in private hands is not known, only guessed at, and that is a good thing.Government is not in the business of and should never be in the business of knowing or attempting to know who among the citizenry is armed and the manner of their armament. That fact goes hand-in-hand with the unalienable right of the people to keep and bear arms.The armed citizenry is the singular source of this Nation's strength, vitality, and well-being; the basis for the sanctity and inviolability of Selfhood; the foundation of a free Constitutional Republic; the necessary condition through which that free Republic may be maintained; and, the ground upon which the sovereignty of the American people over Government is secured and upon which tyranny is resisted, restrained, and repulsed.The High Court should keep all of this in mind when deciding Bruen. But, even a ruling in favor of Petitioners against New York, will not of itself secure the Republic against encroaching Tyranny. For the forces that seek to impose it are powerful, well-organized, and deeply entrenched in our private and public institutions.Governor Kathy Hochul has powerful, ruthless, and inordinately wealthy allies, who will support her if she does not comply with the High Court's rulings, striking down New York City's concealed handgun carry procedures. Indeed, they will certainly dictate policy for her as they have done all along, just as they are doing for New York City Mayor, Eric Adams. The public simply sees in Hochul's policy aims and actions an inkling of the face that hides in the shadows, dictating her policy aims and actions. Hochul's stubbornness, in failing to heed U.S. Supreme Court rulings in Bruen, will certainly tell all Americans, but especially those residing in New York, everything they need to know of the unbridled contempt both she and those that pull her strings have for our people; for our Republic; and for our Nation’s Constitution.Disdain toward High Court rulings does not bode well for the continued security of a free State in the present unhealthy political, social, and economic climate. We have seen this abject disdain played out by State Governments and lower Courts toward Heller and McDonald. Much the same disdain will be played out again in Bruen. That is why Americans must stay true to the plain meaning of the Bill of Rights, especially when it comes to matters of armed self-defense against Tyranny. At the end of the day, the Bill of Rights is all that they have to assert their will on a renegade Government. For the Nation's first Patriots, a firm conviction in the righteousness of their cause, a blanket refusal to surrender their firearms to tyrants, and a valiant will to use those firearms against tyranny, sufficed to vanquish a mighty but ignoble foe. At the time, the Bill of Rights was inchoate. But, the germinating idea of the immutability and illimitability of the natural law right of armed self-defense against tyranny sufficed to win the day.  The germinating idea of the immutability and illimitability of the natural law right of armed self-defense against tyranny sufficed to win the day against seeming insurmountable odds. Today, the Bill of Rights is manifest, and we, the armed citizenry, are legion. We descendants of the first Patriots should be able to repulse tyranny that once again threatens a free and sovereign people. Can we do so, if the need arises? If we have the will and wherewithal to resist tyranny, then we, Americans, will have all that is necessary to vanquish tyranny once again._____________________________________________*Menken’s book purports to be a guide for political leaders on how to bring the Country together to resolve the Nation’s differences. Yet, one year after publication of her book, it is clear from her NYTimes letter Times, that Menken has had a change of heart; surrendered to the truth that reconciliation is impossible. That should have been obvious to her. It wasn’t. How can there be a meeting of minds?There are two antithetical ideologies at play. One ideology is grounded on the principles, precepts, and tenets laid down in our Nation’s sacred documents. The other intends to set it all aside. One ideology was forged in the Nation’s struggle for independence from tyranny. The proponents of that ideology seek to preserve the Natural Law Rights and Liberties of the people. They intend to maintain and preserve the success of the American Revolution.The other ideology, grounded on the principles, tenets, and precepts of Collectivism, much in evidence today, seeks to upend the hard-fought battle for Independence from tyranny. For Collectivism is predicated on Tyranny. It is inextricably tied to it. In our website, we discussed all of this in several articles some time ago. See, e.g., our article posted four years ago, in 2018, titled: “The Modern American Civil War: A Clash of Ideologies.”At the very birth of the Nation, the enemies of a free State, went immediately to work to waylay and destroy it. These enemies, the Globalist Banking Cartel, commenced a quiet Counterrevolution to dismantle a free State and to usurp the authority of a sovereign people, bending them to their will.The descendants of the Nation’s enemies, the international financiers and their minions, alongside rabid Neo-Marxist radicals, residing inside and outside the United States, are dead-set on destroying this free Republic, as assuredly and as thoroughly as would occur by overt military conquest.Theirs is a Collectivist Counterrevolution. Utilizing modern tools of information and computer technology, psychological conditioning, organizational acumen, inexhaustible reserves of money, and control over Government and over the levers of commerce, media, and finance. They intend to destroy the political, social, economic, and juridical foundations of the Country, merging its remains into the nascent EU/UN super-state that is taking shape throughout the world._______________________________**The poem: “Ten little Indian boys went out to dine; One choked his little self and then there were Nine. Nine little Indian boys sat up very late; One overslept himself and then there were Eight. Eight little Indian boys travelling in Devon; One said he'd stay there and then there were Seven. Seven little Indian boys chopping up sticks; One chopped himself in halves and then there were Six. Six little Indian boys playing with a hive; A bumblebee stung one and then there were Five. Five little Indian boys going in for law; One got into Chancery and then there were Four. Four little Indian boys going out to sea; A red herring swallowed one and then there were Three. Three little Indian boys walking in the Zoo; A big bear hugged one and then there were Two. Two little Indian boys were out in the sun; One got all frizzled up and then there was one*. One little Indian boy left all alone; He went out and hanged himself and then there were none. (*In some versions Two Little Indian boys playing with a gun; One shot the other and then there was one.) ~From IMDB, referencing the afore-recited poem, Ten Little Indians, from the 1965 mystery film thriller by the same name.”___________________________________Copyright © 2022 Roger J Katz (Towne Criour), Stephen L. D’Andrilli (Publius) All Rights Reserved  

NEW YORK SENATOR CHUCK SCHUMER’S RESPONSE TO RESIDENTS’ CONCERN OVER FUTURE CONGRESSIONAL “GUN CONTROL LEGISLATION” LEAVES MUCH TO BE DESIRED

Concerned American citizens, residents of New York, recently reached out to the new Senate Majority leader, Chuck Schumer (D-NY) expressing legitimate concern over Democrats’ goals pertaining to “gun control legislation.” They looked to the Senator for clarification and for assurances that the Democratic Party has no intention of gutting a sacred, cherished, fundamental, natural right codified in the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.It was, perhaps, in the hope of hearing something new, something refreshing, something positive for a change—anything but the usual depressingly familiar contrived nonsense—that may have prompted the query to the new Senate Majority Leader in the first place. If that was the questioners’ hope, they were sorely disappointed. But give Schumer credit for something, as he did, at least, respond.In a carefully worded letter, ostensibly written with the intention to allay the legitimate fears of American gun owners that the right of the people to keep and bear arms remains an endangered species, one, indeed, on the verge of imminent extinction, under both a Democrat-Party controlled Congress and Democrat Executive Branch, the Senator merely regurgitates the usual Party-line patter, platitudes, clichés, and banalities that Americans had heard from the Democratic Party leadership ad nauseum for the past three decades, and now, as then, delivered in the same distant, smug, superficial, disingenuous, and oily tone. Schumer writes,“Thank you for contacting me regarding gun control legislation. Like you, I believe the right to bear arms is guaranteed by the Constitution's Second Amendment.While I respect the Second Amendment to the Constitution, I believe that we have a collective interest in keeping guns out of the hands of those who want to harm the innocent. I believe it is possible to strike a reasonable balance.I have long advocated for faster and more accurate background checks so legal purchasers can receive their guns quickly while ensuring criminals do not illegally purchase and possess firearms. After the tragedy at Virginia Tech in 2007, I took a leading role in passing the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) Improvement Amendments Act through the Senate. This legislation, supported by the National Rifle Association, authorizes funds for states to compile required background data into the shared NICS database. Ensuring that this information is comprehensive and up to date will better prevent criminals from illegally purchasing and possessing firearms.I have also fought to create new opportunities for law abiding citizens to exercise their right to use guns. That includes working to expand hunting grounds in NYS by creating a financial incentive to allow private landowners to allow hunters to access their property.”Senator Schumer’s letter demonstrates neither an understanding of the import of the sacred, fundamental, natural, and immutable right of the people to own and possess firearms nor does it exhibit a true appreciation for the level of concern that prompted Americans to contact Schumer.On the surface, Schumer’s letter may come across to some as polite and respectful, but beneath the surface, the letter exhibits a cold and callous impatience and an odd, almost clinical detachment, along with more than a smidgeon of condescension that detracts from what little of worth, if anything, can be derived from the letter’s content. And it is that content that we discuss here.But, before proceeding with an analysis of Schumer’s remarks, we wish to point out that subsequent to Schumer’s response to New York residents’ request for clarification as to Democrat Party’s intentions pertaining to antigun legislation, Joe Biden made abundantly clear to the American citizenry of his own intention to go after the right of the people to keep and bear arms. He did so in a carefully worded statement delivered to the Press in the Rose Garden, on April 8, 2021, and we assume that, whatever the Democrat-controlled Congress has in mind in terms of dealing with civilian citizen gun ownership and possession, those Congressional plans will be consistent with, and in full accord with, and likely coordinated with Biden’s Presidential actions.In his delivery to the Press, Biden declares that he will be signing several executive orders to address gun violence, and that he will be directing his administration to tighten restrictions on so-called ghost guns, or untraceable weapons that can be constructed from parts purchased online. See USA Today report on this. And, a CNN report on Biden’s Rose Garden address mentions that Schumer will be scheduling votes on gun legislation, demonstrating the Biden’s executive actions and Schumer’s Congressional gun legislation plans are being coordinated behind closed doors, after all.So, now after an initial flurry of executive orders and other actions rubber-stamped by Biden, the destroyers of our Constitution and Republic are, as we expected getting around, as we knew they would, to their pet fetish, attacks on the right of the people to keep and bear arms, and they are doing so in a robust fashion.Biden’s remarks delivered with the dry, emotionless, mindless hesitancy, one invariably witnesses from a person in the throes of incipient and imminent mental decline, will be dealt with in turn—along with his executive actions—once he signs them, in a subsequent Arbalest Quarrel article, along with his soon to be released executive orders.We now return to Schumer’s letter. Below are the key points Schumer makes. We first list those points and then address them.

• Schumer claims to support the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, specifically saying, “Like you, I believe the right to bear arms is guaranteed by the Constitution's Second Amendment.”
• Schumer claims to believe that we—meaning all Americans— “have a collective interest in keeping guns out of the hands of those who want to harm the innocent. I believe it is possible to strike a reasonable balance,” he says.
• Schumer asserts that he has “long advocated for faster and more accurate background checks so legal purchasers can receive their guns quickly while ensuring criminals do not illegally purchase and possess firearms [that he] took a leading role in passing the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) Improvement Amendments Act through the Senate” and that NRA supported this.
• Lastly, Schumer exclaims how much he has “create[d] new opportunities for law abiding citizens to exercise their right to use guns. That includes working to expand hunting grounds in NYS by creating a financial incentive to allow private landowners to allow hunters to access their property.”

The first thing that strikes us and at once rankles us is Schumer’s pretense of being one of us, i.e., an American who cares deeply about safeguarding the sacred right of the people to keep and bear arms, when he most certainly does not.

THE FIRST ISSUE: ON THE MATTER OF SCHUMER’S “BELIEF”

Schumer says he “believes the right to bear arms is guaranteed by the Constitution’s Second Amendment.” But does he, really? No!The duplicity of Schumer’s remark is betrayed by and laid bare in the letter’s verbiage as well as in his Congressional “accomplishments,” during his lengthy tenure in Congress, both as a U.S. Representative in the House, and as a U.S. Senator. All of his actions against securing and preserving the right of the people to keep and bear arms are recorded for posterity.But, let us return to Schumer’s “belief,” and,  from a logical and semantic standpoint, elucidate the meaning of ‘belief,’ for believing something to be true, doesn’t make it true. Schumer says he “believes in the right guaranteed in the Second Amendment.”  That is all well and good if we take the assertion at face value, but the right of the people to keep and bear arms is based not on one’s mere belief that it is so, but on the fact that it is so.Whether one chooses to believe in the right or not, the right exists, irrespective of belief. Many “Americans” choose not to believe in the fact of the right, and loudly and endlessly say so, and with marked disdain. So, what? Does a raw belief in something or other, in the evidence of rational reflection, make it so?There are false beliefs and there are true beliefs. Beliefs that cohere with or correspond with states of affairs, a posteriori, are true, otherwise, they are false.There are also truths that follow from pure, reason, i.e., priori, as do mathematical truths and the existence of a Divine Creator.And there are beliefs derived from one’s value system that don’t reflect inherent declarative truths but say much about a person’s motivations that inform their actions.Democrats’ 180-degree about-turn on the issue of illegal immigration is illustrative of this. Democrat Party leaders, including Chuck Schumer and even a past U.S. President, Barack Obama, at the time a U.S. Senator from Illinois, clearly and cogently asserted, “We are a generous and welcoming people here in the United States—but those who enter the country illegally, and those who employ them disrespect the rule of law. They are showing disregard for those who are following the law. We simply cannot allow people to pour into the United States undetected, undocumented, unchecked, and circumventing the line of people who are waiting patiently and lawfully to become immigrants.” See, e.g., Townhall report.And recall Schumer’s own remarks on illegal immigration—a position cogently and categorically stated—but that he has since disavowed.“‘Illegal immigration is wrong, plain and simple’ Chuck Schumer said during a 2009 speech. This was during Obama’s presidency, mind you. ‘People who enter the United States without our permission are illegal aliens,’ he continued. ‘When we use phrases like “undocumented workers,” we convey a message to the American people that their government is not serious about combating illegal immigration.’” From the website, Political Insider.So, even accepting for purpose of argument, that Schumer is being honest about his belief here, however dubious, he need not stand by it, just as his early assertions about illegal immigration—delivered with an air of pomposity, false piety, and moral certitude and conviction, at the time, turned out to be as fleeting and as ephemeral as a wisp of smoke.By reducing the right of the people to keep and bear arms to mere belief, and perfunctorily asserting a belief in the right sans even a hint of conviction, Schumer is suggesting he could be wrong about his belief, and thereafter he can and would certainly claim he was simply mistaken about the very guarantee he claims he once believed in. Both he and the rest of the Party can then proceed merrily along their way to erode the American citizenry’s exercise of a fundamental right and continue to enact legislation to constrain the exercise of it. This includes legislation creating onerous costs in time and money, and further burdensome restrictions on use, contrary to private property protections codified in the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments. Such restrictive gun legislation also intrudes on one’s privacy, in contradistinction to the unreasonable searches and seizures clause of the Fourth Amendment.At the moment Schumer, and other Party leaders, demur explicitly and categorically from denying the import of the fundamental, natural, and unalienable right of the people to keep and bear arms, outright, but give them time.Schumer’s goal and that of others who abhor the very notion of an armed citizenry is de facto repeal of the Second Amendment, accomplished through incremental action. By slowly, inexorably legislating away the exercise of the right to keep and bear arms, outright de jure repeal of the Second Amendment—is unnecessary, and at the moment given that outright repeal of the Second Amendment not only immensely difficult but empirically impossible. Once exercise of the right codified in the Second Amendment has been effectively nullified by Congressional legislation, U.S. Presidential executive action, and Administrative agency rulings, Schumer and others of his ilk can give up any pretense that they support the “guarantee” of the right of the people to keep and bear arms. At that point Schumer would have no compunction of admitting his error in ever having held to a “belief” in the Second Amendment, any more than he has disavowed his earlier remarks concerning his stance on illegal immigration. But, if one can change his belief system as easily and as one changes his clothes.But, seriously, if one were to take Schumer at his word that he does honestly believe in the “guarantee” of the Second Amendment, one would expect his past actions to align with the assertion. The website “On the Issues,” though paints a different picture.In a nutshell, this is what Schumer’s belief in the Second Amendment’s guarantee has amounted to when words are compared to actions:

• Enforce gun laws on national security grounds. (Dec 2003)
• Renew assault weapons ban - no legitimate use for them. (Nov 2003)
• Penalize cross-state gun traffickers. (Sep 2003)
• Cutting record-keeping limits fosters gun sale fraud & abuse. (Jun 2001)
• Voted YES on banning high-capacity magazines of over 10 bullets. (Apr 2013)
• Voted NO on allowing firearms in checked baggage on Amtrak trains. (Apr 2009)
• Voted NO on prohibiting foreign & UN aid that restricts US gun ownership. (Sep 2007)
• Voted NO on prohibiting lawsuits against gun manufacturers. (Jul 2005)
• Voted NO on banning lawsuits against gun manufacturers for gun violence. (Mar 2004)
• Voted YES on background checks at gun shows. (May 1999)
• Voted NO on more penalties for gun & drug violations. (May 1999)
• Voted NO on loosening license & background checks at gun shows. (May 1999)
• Close the Gun Show Loophole; restrict show sales. (May 2009)
• Ban large-capacity ammunition. (Jan 2013)
• Supports restrictions on right to bear arms. (Nov 2016)
• Co-sponsored background check for every firearm sale. (Jan 2019)

It is difficult to square Schumer’s Congressional actions that demonstrate a marked consistency for constraining the exercise of the right of the people to keep and bear arms with his assertion he believes in the guarantee of the Second Amendment. But, this point leads into the most critical issue that Schumer's letter raises which goes directly to the relationship between the Amendments that comprise the Bill of Rights of the U.S. Constitution and the fundamental Rights that the Amendments refer to. For, if THE GUARANTEE of the Second Amendment or of any one of the other Nine Amendments is predicated on, depends upon the incorporation of the Bill of Rights into the U.S. Constitution, this logically implies that preservation of—nay, the very existence of—the underlying Right depends upon or is a function of incorporation of the Amendment into the Constitution, itself. But, is that true? This certainly holds true for some Amendments—namely and particularly some of the Amendments ratified and thereupon incorporated into the U.S. Constitution subsequent to ratification of the Bill of Rights in 1791, subsequent Amendments that, in language, are of a procedural nature or that did not entail fundamental, natural rights, unlike those comprising the Bill of Rights. But, does that assumption hold true across the board? Senator Schumer obviously thinks so as do other Democrat Party leaders. And they certainly treat the Bill of Rights as if this were true. But this is where Schumer and other Democrats of like mind are wrong, horribly wrong. And the consequences of their horrendous error allow for, provide the rationale for, are the functional basis for, and are at the very heart of present, furious and rapid actions of the Democrat Party leadership to erase the Bill of Rights; reinterpret the Constitution's Articles, and ultimately disassemble the U.S. Constitution; and if successful, this will lead, cannot help but lead, inevitably, inexorably to a very different America: transforming a free Constitutional Republic, an independent, sovereign Nation-State, a sovereign American people into something monstrous, something hideous; something outside the bounds of rationality; certainly something anathema to the founders' vision of a Nation founded on and grounded on the principles and tenets of Individualism. And the fruits of the founders' vision is seen and clearly recognized in a Nation, that, in the space of well less than three hundred years, has grown to become the most powerful, the wealthiest, the most beneficent, morally sound, economically healthiest, and geopolitically most secure Nation on Earth; truly the envy of the world. And, yet, Democrats and their benefactors are working toward, and lackadaisical Republicans are allowing to happen, a horrific disassembling of our Nation and the enslavement of our people, and in very short order.  

THE SECOND AND MOST CRITICAL ISSUE AND MOST DAMNING EVIDENCE OF SCHUMER’S DUPLICITY: SCHUMER CONFLATES THE NATURAL “RIGHT OF THE PEOPLE TO KEEP AND BEAR ARMS” WITH THE NUMBER RANKING OF THE RIGHT, “SECOND AMENDMENT,” PRESUMING, ERRONEOUSLY, THAT THE RIGHT, LIKE THE NUMERICAL CONVENIENCE, IS MANMADE RATHER THAN GOD-BESTOWED.

Schumer, as with other Democrats, have a penchant for claiming to respect the second Amendment but those claims are belied by their actions as they proceed to systematically disassemble exercise of the right embodied in it. They seemingly avoid the duplicity, hypocrisy, and inconsistency between assertion and action by attempting to draw a distinction, albeit tacitly, between the words, “Second Amendment,” and the Right embodied therein.This distinction is aptly illustrated in a passage from a Press Release of another anti-Second Amendment fanatic, Senator Leahy—one of several he released to the public during the U.S. Supreme Court Confirmation Hearing of Sonia Sotomayor, back in 2009. Leahy states,“When the Supreme Court handed down its decision in District of Columbia v. Heller last year, I applauded the Court for affirming what so many Americans already believe: The Second Amendment protects an individual right to own a firearm.  The Heller decision reaffirmed and strengthened our Bill of Rights.Vermont has some of the least restrictive gun laws in the country.  One does not need a permit to carry a concealed firearm, and Vermonters are trusted to conduct themselves responsibly and safely. In my experience, Vermonters do just that. Like many Vermonters, I grew up with firearms and have enormous respect and appreciation for the freedoms that the Second Amendment protects. In fact, I own many firearms. Like other rights protected by our Bill of Rights, the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms is a right I cherish.”Recall this is the same man who would later hold a mock Confirmation Hearing for Judge Merrick Garland. He held a mock Hearing to demonstrate his anger over then Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnel’s decision not to hold a U.S. Supreme Court Confirmation Hearing on Obama’s nominee to the Supreme Court, knowing full well that Garland, along with “Living Constitution” liberal-Wing Justices of the Court, and with the pseudo-Constitutional Originalist/Textualist, John Roberts, would shred the right embodied in the Second Amendment if given the opportunity to do so.See Arbalest Quarrel article, posted on May 31, 2016.  Merrick Garland’s track record demonstrates clear antipathy toward the right of the people to keep and bear arms. See also Arbalest Quarrel letter directed to Senator Grassley, posted on the Arbalest Quarrel, as an open letter, on April 27, 2016.It is a curious thing and more than a trifle baffling to witness the hypocrisy and rank disingenuousness of those Democrat Party Leaders, like Chuck Schumer, who declare support for the Second Amendment even as their policy goals and initiatives demonstrate their transparent disdain, contempt for, and even loathing of it.But then, it need be mentioned and emphasized that Democrats never refer to the existence of the right of the people to keep and bear arms apart from their reference through invocation of the words: “Second Amendment.” Does reference to the words, “Second Amendment,” in lieu of the words codified in the Second Amendment or as used together with the actual statement of the Right mean something different than straightforward assertion that the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed? It does.

WHY DO PEOPLE LIKE SCHUMER CONSTANTLY CLAIM TO RESPECT THE “SECOND AMENDMENT” BUT REFRAIN FROM SAYING THEY RESPECT “THE RIGHT OF THE PEOPLE TO KEEP AND BEAR ARMS”?

Let’s go back to the opening statements of Schumer’s letter, the Senator says he believes in the Second Amendment and he goes on to say in that letter that he believes in the right to bear arms “as guaranteed in the Second Amendment.” He invariably mentions support for the “Second Amendment” but never support for the language Of the Second Amendment, codified IN the Amendment.Schumer is never heard to say in his letter to New York residents or, to the best of our knowledge and belief, anywhere else in any written or oral statement, during his tenure as a U.S. Senator or as a Congressman, that he accepts as true, and beyond refutation 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.”Is this a mere quibble on our part? No, it isn’t!Schumer and others who detest the very existence of an armed citizenry very carefully refrain from referring directly to the language of the Right, OF and IN the Second Amendment, apart from mere reference TO the “Second Amendment.” This is no accident.The delineation of a sequence of Amendments, from One to Ten, in the Bill of Rights, are manmade constructs.These constructs MUST BE distinguished from the natural, GOD-GIVEN RIGHT, itself.The fact of the matter is the right of the people to keep and bear arms exists intrinsically in man. The Right is existent in man’s very being. It is bestowed on and in man by the loving Creator. The right of the people to keep and bear arms as a natural right is not a creature of Government and is not properly to be construed as such.But it’s easy for a person to mistake a GOD-GIVEN RIGHT for a MANMADE RIGHT, by equating the words, ‘SECOND AMENDMENT,’ a manmade construct and an obviously mutable and destructible construct, with the RIGHT, itself, contained in the AMENDMENT, which is immutable and indestructible.The importance of this distinction has legal and logical consequence and is not to be trivialized.Recall for a moment Biden’s assertion during his Rose Garden address, on Thursday, April 8, 2021, to the Press. Biden asserts, at one point, as his speechwriters required of him, that,“No amendment, no amendment to the Constitution is absolute. You can’t yell 'fire' in a crowded movie theater — recall a freedom of speech. From the very beginning, you couldn’t own any weapon you wanted to own. From the very beginning that the Second Amendment existed, certain people weren’t allowed to have weapons.” From Fox news story, titled, “Biden on the Second Amendment: ‘No amendment is absolute.’” It is one thing to say an “AMENDMENT” to the U.S. Constitution is not absolute, just as no “ARTICLE” in the U.S. Constitution is absolute. But this only means the Articles of the Constitution as with a delineation of numerical “Amendments” are both manmade constructs. Indeed some Amendments to the Constitution, such as the Amendment prohibiting alcohol, could be and were subsequently repealed. But, then, the prohibition on alcoholic beverages was never a natural, God-Given right.The RIGHTS comprising the Bill of Rights are NATURAL—preeminent and preexistent—and, so, are not subject to lawful Governmental manipulation that would transform a FUNDAMENTAL, RIGHT into a mere IMPERMANENT GOVERNMENT BESTOWED OR GOVERNMENT RESCINDED PRIVILEGE.Thus, while it is true that the Second Amendment, perceived as an enumeration in a table, didn’t exist prior to ratification of the Bill of Rights, as Biden asserts, this isn’t to mean the Right, itself, to which the Second Amendment refers didn’t exist prior to the Amendment. The Amendment serves merely as an explicit codification of the Right that always DID exist, just as the Divine Creator DOES ALWAYS EXIST.In that regard, recall that Biden’s writers did not have Biden assert, “the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed” isn’t absolute. Why is that? Biden’s writers and handlers didn’t allow Biden to say that because the right itself, bestowed on Man by the Divine Creator, cannot lawfully be modified, abrogated, abridged, denied, or ignored. The Right, itself, IS ABSOLUTE.On some level, the writers of Biden’s Rose Garden speech must be aware of the distinction between the RIGHT, as DIVINE LAW, and the descriptor that merely alludes to it, because they know the framers understood the Rights, they codified in the BILL OF RIGHTS, are FUNDAMENTAL, and, by that understanding and, by that logic, must be construed as ABSOLUTE, even if Biden’s handlers, who prepared his Rose Garden address to the Press don’t accept the truth of the idea of fundamental, preexisting, natural, God-given Rights.Still, the Bill of Rights is grounded on that idea, and that idea is the foundation of the Nation as a free Constitutional Republic and of the sovereignty of the American people and of the bedrock principles of Individualism.But then, what are Americans to make of the inexorable whittling away of a fundamental Right and an American’s absolute right to exercise that Right?Any action to dilute a God-Given Right by Government, on the ground of arguably ostensible pragmatic necessity must be carefully considered from the perspective of the possible deleterious ramifications and effects of that Governmental action on the sanctity and inviolability of the individual Soul, as a person’s autonomy proceeds from and is governed by NATURAL LAW, not from MANMADE LAW. Pragmatic necessity may dictate restrictions on exercise of fundamental rights, but such pragmatic necessity is by definition unlawful, as contrary to Divine Law. THE RIGHT OF THE PEOPLE TO KEEP AND BEAR ARMS DOESN’T EXIST BECAUSE OF OR FOLLOW FROM THE SECOND AMENDMENT. THE RIGHT EXISTS INDEPENDENTLY OF THE SECOND AMENDMENT, i.e., THE RIGHT EXISTS IRRESPECTIVE OF THE SECOND AMENDMENT MANMADE CONSTRUCT. The Second Amendment, as a codification of Divine, Natural Law, ISN’T identical to, synonymous with, or a substitute for the Divine, Natural Law itself.Schumer, Leahy, and others mistakenly assume that since the right of the people to keep and bear arms was placed into a manmade Document, the BILL OF RIGHTS, and given a number—2—along with other RIGHTS that were each given numbers and also placed into that manmade Document, this must mean that the BILL OF RIGHTS, as with the ARTICLES of the CONSTITUTION, and all subsequent Congressional statutes, agency rules, and executive actions, orders, and edicts are to be construed as nothing more than manmade creations, subject to modification, or abrogation. So, they say. But such a notion is both false and dangerous.Such a notion is false because—and it bears repeating—fundamental Rights do not emanate from man; they emanate from God. And the notion is dangerous because it undercuts the very structure of our free Constitutional Republic that is predicated on the sovereignty of the American people over Government.Schumer and Leahy and others mistake the INSUBSTANTIALITY of the mere words, ‘Second Amendment,’ for the REALITY of what it is that the words denote: THE SUBSTANTIAL, FUNDAMENTAL, IMMUTABLE, ILLIMITABLE, ETERNAL, INDESTRUCTIBLE, NATURAL, DIVINE RIGHT, ITSELF. This is no small matter to reflect upon for it informs every action people like Schumer and Leahy and others take as they attempt to enact legislation to erode Natural Rights that are not lawfully susceptible to erosion precisely because Natural Rights aren’t themselves manmade laws.AMERICAN HISTORY BEARS OUT THE SINGULARLY IMPORTANT IMPERATIVE: NATURAL RIGHTS MUST NOT BE TOYED WITH.The words, ‘Second Amendment,’ as with descriptors for the other fundamental, natural, unalienable Rights, the First, Third, Fourth, and so on—as the framers of the U.S. Constitution knew full well—are merely an acknowledgment of the Divine nature of the Right to which the descriptor alludes; it is that and nothing more than that. American History reinforces the truth of this statement.Among the framers of the U.S. Constitution, there were two factions: The Federalists and the Antifederalists. But, unlike Chuck Schumer and other politicians today, the Constitution’s framers—whether they were Federalist or Antifederalist—all recognized the existence of a body of basic, natural, Rights that exist in Man, independently of Government. Chuck Schumer and the rest of the Democrat Party leadership do not recognize the existence of natural Rights that predate the Constitution and that preexist in Man.The Federalists felt a written document, delineating God-Bestowed Rights—as codification of natural law—need not and ought not to be codified. They felt codification of natural law is at best redundant and therefore unnecessary and, at worst, self-defeating because codification of natural law might be perceived as self-limiting in the sense that only those natural laws expressly stated could lawfully be exercised by Americans as only those rights, explicitly delineated, would be recognized by the Federal Government.The Antifederalists disagreed with the reasoning of the Federalists and, for Americans who truly cherish a codification of natural law, it is fortunate that the Antifederalists won the day.The Antifederalists realized that failure to codify natural law could very well lead future Government servants to deny the existence of natural law if such law weren’t explicitly set down and incorporated into the Constitution.Redundancy was of little concern to the Antifederalists. But if a document delineating natural law were to be perceived as self-limiting, as the Federalists rightfully feared and as they posed to the Antifederalists, that would be problematic, but it was a problem easily circumvented through the addition of language in the Bill of Rights.The Antifederalists resolved the problem by use of a catch-all Ninth Amendmentthat reads: “The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.”Curiously, many legal scholars to this day give little credence to the Ninth Amendment precisely because they eschew the notion of natural law that has not been expressly articulated in the Bill of Rights, demanding therefor that natural law be delimited to those Rights explicitly stated and enumerated and not allow for others. But this just goes to show the Antifederalists’ concern over and demand for a codification of natural law was pertinent and prescient. Imagine if the Bill of Rights had not existed. You certainly wouldn’t hear people like Senators Schumer and Leahy claiming the existence of a natural right to keep and bear arms, would you?Schumer and Leahy only acknowledge the Right because they are compelled to do so, and they are compelled to do so precisely because of the law’s explicit delineation in the Bill of Rights. But, because they invariably refer to the manmade Descriptor of the natural God-given Right, either mistaking the Descriptor for the Right itself or doing so intentionally so as to deceive the public, they conclude, whether intentionally deceptively so or not, that the Right, like the Descriptor, ‘Second Amendment,’ is manmade. In this, they are either, unbeknownst to themselves, victims of logical error, or they know are cunning liars.But, whether through honest mistake or devious, diabolical deception, they plow ahead anyway. Thus, they have no compunction against enacting more and more restrictions on the exercise of the Right of the people to keep and bear arms embodied in the Descriptor, the Second Amendment, with the goal of eventually legislating the Amendment out of existence, and with that, denying to Americans exercise of a fundamental, natural, immutable, and indestructible Right that Government cannot lawfully deny Americans from exercising.But, because the Right is cast as an Amendment to the Constitution rather than as a mere Statute enacted by Congress, they recognize the difficulty in erasing the Right outright, much as they would like to do so. They are left to the need to nullify it slowly, incrementally, through Statute. This they have done and continue to do and that distresses them to no end.

THE THIRD ISSUE: SCHUMER’S OFFER OF PROOF OF SUPPORT FOR THE “SECOND AMENDMENT” IS DUBIOUS

In his letter Schumer says he backed the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) Improvement Amendments Act of 2007 that was supported by the NRA. In fact, Schumer is correct that the NRA-ILA did support this Act, which amended NICS to provide federal funding for the maintenance of up-to-date mental health records in the national background check system. And it isn’t necessary to take Schumer’s word for this, because NRA’s argument for supporting this legislation is found on its own website.But, Schumer also makes much of the fact, in the letter that he has “long advocated for faster and more accurate background checks so legal purchasers can receive their guns quickly while ensuring criminals do not illegally purchase and possess firearms.” Fine. But now let’s jump ahead to the present day; and we see Democrat Party attempting to do what Schumer, in his letter, congratulates himself for not doing: creating roadblocks for American gun owners, to delay completion of firearms transactions; to create unnecessary paperwork, more time and monetary expense, and to create a federal firearms’ registry. See article in Second Amendment Daily News.If Schumer is being honest in his remarks to New York residents, as set forth in his letter, he would not support House bills, H.R. 8 and H.R. 1446, or any antigun bills like them that might happen to wend their way to the U.S. Senate.And we know that Senator Schumer is himself taking the lead in advancing further gun control measures in the Senate. In particular, we wish to ask Schumer why, in fact, he is working toward enacting more draconian gun background checks since he argues in his letter that he has already taken care of that issue. See recent Hill article:“Majority Leader Chuck Schumer pledged the Senate will take on gun control measures in the wake of Monday's Boulder, Colo., mass shooting that left 10 people dead, including a police officer.Schumer, D-N.Y., said the Senate will specifically move to expand gun background checks—an effort that has long evaded passage in the upper chamber.” It’s one thing to prevent criminals from having access to firearms. But why is it that the vast majority of antigun legislation targets tens of millions of average responsible, rational law-abiding citizens? Schumer dodges that question in his letter and dodges, as well, talking about his long history of promoting and supporting extraordinarily restrictive gun laws, impacting on every American but the career criminal.But let’s look closer at home at what Schumer is doing OR NOT DOING on behalf of his own native New Yorkers on familiar New York City home turf from whence he sprang.

THE FOURTH ISSUE: SCHUMER DOESN’T EXPRESS AN INTEREST IN PROTECTING THE CITIZENS OF HIS OWN HOMETOWN EVEN AS HE PROFESSES TO CARE ABOUT NEW YORK STATE

What is Schumer doing to get the Marxist Mayor, de Blasio to get off his duff. If de Blasio won’t allow the police to provide protection for the City, why doesn’t Schumer utilize his considerable clout as Senate Majority Leader to demand that de Blasio see to it that New York’s residents can at least be allowed, what natural law demands: the right to protect one’s own life and that of one’s family. Schumer has done nothing. The website, hotair has this to say about the problem New York residents have in attempting to obtain a firearm for self-defense.“Nervous residents of New York City (at least those who haven’t already fled the area) have been signing up in increasing numbers for firearms permits, many for the first time in their lives. Given the conditions on the ground there, that’s understandable. But making the decision to take advantage of your Second Amendment rights and actually laying your hands on a firearm legally are two very different things in the Big Apple these days. The New York Post is reporting that there’s a significant backlog in permit applications this season, and among those that do manage to get processed, nearly nine in ten are denied. The NYPD’s License Division hasn’t had too much to say about it, but local gun dealers suspect that this isn’t entirely accidental, while a variety of factors have led to the surge in demand.The Big Apple’s staggering surge in shootings amid the COVID-19 pandemic has led nearly 9,000 terrified New Yorkers to apply for gun permits — but the NYPD has signed off on fewer than 1,100, The Post has learned.The 8,088 applications for first-time pistol and rifle permits submitted since March 22 — when coronavirus-related restrictions went into effect — represent a threefold-plus increase over the 2,562 submitted between March 22 and Dec. 31, 2019, NYPD statistics obtained by The Post this week show.But only 1,087 applications were approved, far less than the 1,778 granted during the same period last year, according to the official data.There are two primary aspects of this phenomenon to consider, those being why approval rates are down and why demand is so high. The first one is the more disturbing of the two.Last year, between March and December, the gun permit approval rate was close to 70%. But during the same period in 2020, the approval rate is less than 14 percent. You might be tempted to believe that these figures represent a lot more people applying who turn out to have criminal records or other disqualifying factors, but that doesn’t seem to be the case. Some (probably larger) percentage are being denied, of course, but a lot of the applications simply aren’t being processed. One reason is that many officers from the NYPD’s License Division have been pulled off and sent to other assignments during all of the riots and unrest. But some cops believe that this slowdown is being at least partly driven from the top down.The cause for the surge in demand seems more obvious. Shootings and murders are up significantly in the city, as are robberies. There are still regular massive gatherings in the streets and you never know when the “peaceful protesters” are going to suddenly turn out to be an angry mob that’s trying to drag you out of your car and beat you. People are frightened and looking to defend themselves if they can.In fact, sources inside the NYPD have noted that this slowdown in permit approvals isn’t something that just cropped up recently. It began when the George Floyd protests kicked off in the spring.A source familiar with the situation said would-be gun owners began flooding the department with permit applications shortly after the May 25 police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis, which sparked widespread protests, including in the Big Apple.Some of the local demonstrations led to riots and looting, including the ransacking of Macy’s famed flagship store in Manhattan’s Herald Square.No matter what combination of factors is driving this issue, it’s unacceptable. Many of the people who have seen their applications simply disappear into the void have no criminal record should easily have been approved. The Post spoke to owners of jewelry stores that have been robbed repeatedly during the riots who have waited all year for a permit and are unable to get one. But City Hall doesn’t seem the least bit interested in investigating and resolving this problem.”Schumer says not a word about this perplexing, confounding, and outrageous problem on his own home turf. Instead, Schumer concludes his letter by saying,“I have also fought to create new opportunities for law-abiding citizens to exercise their right to use guns. That includes working to expand hunting grounds in NYS by creating a financial incentive to allow private landowners to allow hunters to access their property.”Why should this even be required? It shouldn’t even register on the psyche. The right of private landowners to allow hunters access to their own property should follow from the natural right of a person to have exclusive use and enjoyment of his own property, anyway, both realty and personalty. To say that he will provide legislation to allow this implies that a person doesn’t have the right of enjoyment of his own property unless or until the Government deigns to permit exclusive use and enjoyment of one’s property. That is bizarre in a free-market Capitalist economy, as an extension of a free Constitutional Republic that extols the right of individual ownership of and enjoyment of one’s property, free from Governmental interference.In any event, while Schumer demonstrates an apparent desire to assist human beings to hunt animals on their own property—which they ought to be able to do anyway—he demurs from allowing human beings the effective ability to protect themselves from two-legged animals that prey on innocent humans on the streets of New York City and that threaten the innocent in their own homes and businesses.Good going Chuck! It’s nice to see that you have a good sense of just where your priorities need to be!____________________________________Copyright © 2021 Roger J Katz (Towne Criour), Stephen L. D’Andrilli (Publius) All Rights Reserved.

SUPREME COURT MAJORITY SIDES WITH NEW YORK CITY IN GUN TRANSPORT CASE DECISION

PART ONE

SUPREME COURT DECISION BAD FOR NEW YORK AND BAD OMEN FOR REST OF NATION

The U.S. Supreme Court just released its decision, April 27, 2020, in the New York “Gun Transport” case: New York State Rifle & Pistol Association, Inc., vs. Petitioners V. City Of New York, 590 U.S ____ (2020), and it isn’t good. You can read the decision here on the SCOTUS website.

WHAT WAS THE NEW YORK CITY GUN TRANSPORT CASE ABOUT?

“Petitioners [NYSRPA] sought declaratory and injunctive relief against enforcement of the rule insofar as the rule prevented their transport of firearms to a second home or shooting range outside of the city. The District Court and the Court of Appeals rejected petitioners’ claim. See 883 F. 3d 45 (CA2 2018). We granted certiorari.  586 U. S. ___ (2019).  After we granted certiorari, the State of New York amended its firearm licensing statute, and the City amended the rule so that petitioners may now transport firearms to a second home or shooting range outside of the city, which is the precise relief that petitioners requested in the prayer for relief in their complaint.”New York City changed its law, fearing the Supreme Court would find the law unconstitutional. The last thing anti-Second Amendment forces want is a high Court opinion that strengthens the Second Amendment. The City’s gambit paid off. In a 6 to 3 vote, the Supreme Court held that, since the City changed the old rule, the case is moot, because Petitioners can now lawfully transport their handgun to a second home or shooting range outside the City. But can they really? What will New York City do in the future to restrict the fundamental right of the people to keep and bear arms? This will almost certainly embolden New York City Mayor Bill DeBlasio and New York Governor Andrew Cuomo.Cuomo has threatened to destroy the Second Amendment to the Nation many times in the past. In a previous AQ article, titled, “Andrew Cuomo Seeks To Impose New York’s Restrictive Gun Laws On The Entire Nation,” published on our site, on March 31, 2019, we pointed out that,“In January of 2019 . . . Cuomo announced plans . . .  to increase gun control within the first 100 days of the new legislative session,’ and he chortled, ‘New York already has the strongest gun safety laws in the nation, and we are taking additional steps to make our laws even stronger and keep our communities, and our schools, safe. Together, we will pass this common sense legislation and send a clear message to Washington that gun violence has no place in our state or nation. . . .’ ‘[t]he rest of the country should take up legislation similar to the Safe Act gun control. . . . ’” The high Court’s gun transport case decision gives Cuomo and others who seek to destroy the Second Amendment” confidence that the high Court will be doing nothing to rein them in.

HOW DID INDIVIDUAL JUSTICES VOTE?

As you may have suspected, the liberal wing of the Court, along with Chief Justice Roberts, voted in favor of the City, to dismiss the case. Justices Alito, Thomas, and Gorsuch dissented.Curiously and disturbingly, Trump’s second nominee to the high Court, Brett Kavanaugh, agreed with Chief Justice Roberts and the liberal wing, but filed a “Concurring Opinion” acknowledging that Justice Alito’s concern over some State and federal Court mishandling of Heller and McDonald warrants high Court review but that the Court can do so in other cases pending before the Court.The high Court remanded the case to the New York Court of Appeals but only to discuss Petitioner’s argument for damages. But the issue of damages is of no consequence. It is injunctive relief the NYSRPA wanted. Anti-Constitutional forces in government consistently, unconscionably, and contemptuously enact laws designed to infringe the core of the Second Amendment without regard to the Heller and McDonald rulings. The NYSRPA wanted and expected the high Court to stop this. The gun transport case would have operated as a good test case. But the Court’s majority folded. What will New York City do in the future to restrict the fundamental right of the people to keep and bear arms?

JUSTICE ALITO'S DISSENTING OPINION

The Majority decided the case in a two-page decision. Justice Alito, who penned the McDonald decision, wrote a thirty-one page Dissent joined by Justices Thomas and Gorsuch. In his opening remarks Justice Alito began his Dissent with a blanket rebuke of the Majority’s Decision. He says:“By incorrectly dismissing this case as moot, the Court permits our docket to be manipulated in a way that should not be countenanced.  Twelve years ago in District of Columbia v. Heller, 554 U. S. 570 (2008), we held that the Second Amendment protects the right of ordinary Americans to keep and bear arms. Two years later, our decision in McDonald v. Chicago, 561 U. S. 742 (2010), established that this right is fully applicable to the States. Since then, the lower courts have decided numerous cases involving Second Amendment challenges to a variety of federal, state, and local laws. Most have failed. We have been asked to review many of these decisions, but until this case, we denied all such requests. On January 22, 2019, we granted review to consider the constitutionality of a New York City ordinance that burdened the right recognized in Heller.

WHAT IS REALLY GOING ON HERE?

The Supreme Court Majority did not want to deal with the Second Amendment if that would jeopardize the Heller and McDonald precedents. The liberal wing of the Court for its part would wish to avoid a review if the outcome would serve to strengthen the Heller and McDonald precedents.Of course, the liberal wing never agreed with or accepted the Heller and McDonald rulings, and has consistently gone along with government actions to infringe the Second Amendment as if Heller and McDonald rulings never existed.But, Justices Alito, Thomas, and Gorsuch have had enough.Alito made clear New York City’s rescission of the transport gun case rule simply amounts to City’s acknowledging the unconstitutionality of the rule and that the high Court would overturn it.Justice Alito said, in closing:“In sum, the City’s travel restriction burdened the very right recognized in Heller. History provides no support for a restriction of this type.  The City’s public safety arguments were weak on their face, were not substantiated in any way, and were accepted below with no serious probing. And once we granted review in this case, the City’s public safety concerns evaporated. We are told that the mode of review in this case is representative of the way Heller has been treated in the lower courts. If that is true, there is cause for concern. This case is not moot. The City violated petitioners’ Second Amendment right, and we should so hold.  I would reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeals and remand the case to the District Court to provide appropriate relief.”The liberal wing of the Court consistently legislates from the Bench. They abhor the Second Amendment and if they were confident that they could overturn Heller and McDonald, they would do so in a heartbeat. At the moment, they cannot.Chief Justice Robert’s decision comes as no surprise. Justice Kavanaugh’s vote does, however. His concurring opinion reflects that his heart and mind are with Alito, Thomas, and Gorsuch, but he went along with Roberts and the liberal wing of the Court anyway. Why did he do this? To say that the Court will have other opportunities to deal with unlawful attacks on Heller and McDonald doesn’t explain why he would pass on dealing with an outright attack on those seminal cases with a clear opportunity to do so with the gun transport case before him.  That is a “cop-out” pure and simple and Kavanaugh, a careful, perspicacious legal thinker and writer must be called out for an obvious act of frailty, unbefitting him.Is Kavanaugh so really afraid the Radical Left will impeach him, as they have threatened? Does he think they will make good their threat if Biden defeats Trump in the upcoming General Election and if the Democrats not only hold onto the House, but win a majority in the Senate, too? Is the New York City gun transport case just an anomaly or does it signal what we may expect from Kavanaugh in the future: currying favor with the Radical Left and betraying intellectual honesty to halt an impeachment proceeding and trial?On January 24, 2019 AQ wrote an extensive article on the New York gun transport case that, at the time, the high Court agreed to take up. Mayor DeBlasio and The New York Times were fearful and furious. You may read our article, “U.S. Supreme Court To Hear New York Gun Case; Mainstream Media Visibly Worried.”In a forthcoming article AQ will analyze Alito’s dissenting opinion, along with Kavanaugh’s odd, evasive concurring opinion. We will deal with the issue of mootness which deserves serious attention; and will examine how dangerous this decision is for the entire Nation._____________________________________Copyright © 2020 Roger J Katz (Towne Criour), Stephen L. D’Andrilli (Publius) All Rights Reserved.

MITT ROMNEY, THE NATION’S JUDAS, NOW CROWNED HARLEQUIN KING BY DEMOCRATS

A MESSAGE FOR MITT ROMNEY

With your vote to remove U.S. President Donald Trump, you have betrayed your oath; you have betrayed your Nation; you have betrayed the Constitution; and you have betrayed the American people.You must know the President is a staunch defender of our fundamental rights and liberties. Most importantly President Trump is a staunch defender of the Second Amendment and is committed to preserving the sacred right of the people to keep and bear arms. As our founders knew, a free Republic without an armed citizenry is undone.If you had any integrity and common sense you would realize your duty to vote for acquittal. You should have done so. You did not.You might think that voting to acquit the President on one false charge but voting to convict the President on a second false charge absolves you of your treachery. It does not.You cannot “split the difference” here, much as you wish. You do not have the wisdom of King Solomon who, in order to determine a baby’s true mother, among two women each of whom claimed the baby for herself, suggested splitting a baby in two. Of course, the true mother would plead, and did plead, for the baby’s life to be spared. The false mother agreed to have the baby killed. King Solomon then gave the baby to the true mother.Your attempted gambit to appease both Republicans and Democrats has not worked. It never could. You have appeased no one, and you have fooled no one, except, perhaps, yourself.You thought you would appear reasonable, honorable, even righteous to the Senate and to the public. Instead, you come across as you really are, smarmy, shifty, vindictive, self-righteous, hiding behind a false cloak of piety, morality, and religion.On the floor of the U.S. Senate, you talked about the oath you took as a U.S. Senator. This is what you said:“As a Senator-juror, I swore an oath, before God, to exercise ‘impartial justice.’ I am a profoundly religious person. I take an oath before God as enormously consequential. I knew from the outset that being tasked with judging the President, the leader of my own party, would be the most difficult decision I have ever faced. I was not wrong.”You were “not wrong?” Really?When you say you are “not wrong” to vote to convict the President of high crimes and misdemeanors, you are also saying that your fellow Republican Senators, to a person, are wrong, in having voted to acquit the President; and that tens of millions of Americans who elected Donald Trump to serve as the President were wrong in placing their faith in him.Did you not see the President’s Defense team successfully tear the arguments of Schiff and Nadler to shreds? Is it not clear to you that the impeachment and attempted removal of the President from Office was a sham from the start?Can you not see that Pelosi, Schiff, Nadler, and the other Radical Left members of the deformed, mutated Democrat Party, desire to destroy our Constitutional Republic and to destroy the sacred rights and liberties of the American people.Can you not grasp that the Radical Left cannot destroy a Constitutional Republic until they first destroy President Trump who is a bulwark of our Nation’s freedoms and liberties?Do you not see what is plain to every other American? Can you not see that Democrats’ desire to impeach and remove Trump from Office was not based on any action he had taken while in Office but was a part of the Democrats’ design to undermine the Constitution before Trump even took the Oath of Office?Can you not see that these Democrats are once again hatching more schemes to prevent the President from performing his duties? Can you not see the dangers these Democrats pose to the security of our Nation, where the American people are sovereign, not Government?You have allowed your own passions to override your reason and have joined forces with the enemy from within.If you could not stomach the thought of acquitting the U.S. President because of your own personal animosity toward him, why didn’t you at least think about what your actions might do to the entirety of the Nation; to its people, and to the U.S. Constitution before casting a vote to convict the President of the United States on a bogus charge of “Obstruction of Congress.”Is it any wonder the Demo-wrecking crew Pelosi, Schiff, Nadler and the other swarm of oily Democrats, along with their friends in the seditious media, would seemingly welcome you with open arms into their ranks, to be employed as their useful tool. Your hypocrisy and duplicity are on full display before the Nation, as are the hypocrisy and duplicity of the Radical Left Democrats. You belong with each other.Better it would have been if you had never entered politics. But, having done so, your best recourse is to resign from the U.S. Senate. We suggest you go back to your work in private equity, serving your own needs, and not pretend like the hypocritical and duplicitous Democrats, to serve the needs of the Country and its people.__________________________________Copyright © 2018 Roger J Katz (Towne Criour), Stephen L. D’Andrilli (Publius) All Rights Reserved. 

URGENT NOTICE TO ALL AMERICAN CITIZENS: NATIONAL "RIGHT TO CARRY" A HANDGUN FOR SELF-DEFENSE NEEDS YOUR HELP

The Arbalest Quarrel recently published an article, “Attention All Law Abiding Gun Owners: National Concealed Handgun Reciprocity is in Jeopardy.” And this wasn’t the first time we wrote specifically on this critical subject.In February 2018, almost ten months ago, we posted an article discussing 115 H.R. 38, “Concealed Carry Reciprocity Act of 2017.” The article is titled, "It’s Time for National Handgun Carry Reciprocity to Secure the Citizen’s Right of Armed Self-Defense, Throughout The Country.” In that article, we stated:“Representative Richard Hudson (R-NC), introduced the bill on January 3, 2017. The bill passed the House by Roll Call Vote of 231-198, on December 6, 2017. It was sent to the Senate one day later, where it was read twice and then referred to the Senate Judiciary Committee. President Trump supports it. The NRA supports it. And, rank and file law enforcement officers support it too. But, there has been to date no further action on it. The bill sits in limbo. Its prospect of passage is, at present, low. Why is that?What is the U.S. Senate waiting for?”On June 27, 2018, in the Arbalest Quarrel, under the title, “National Concealed Handgun Carry Reciprocity is the Answer To International Islamic Terrorism In The United States,” we once again questioned the seeming lackadaisical attitude of the Senate under the leadership of Mitch McConnell, toward national concealed handgun carry reciprocity. We once again asked,“What is the status of this [115 H.R. 38] bill? It languishes in Committee.” We are still asking. Indeed, why has this bill languished in the Senate Judiciary Committee for almost one year? Clearly, passage of this bill is critical to the strengthening of the Second Amendment, consistent with the intention of the founders of our free Republic who codified the natural right of the people to keep and bear arms, in our Bill of Rights. Since January 2017, the Arbalest Quarrel has written over twenty articles dealing with the importance of national handgun carry reciprocity. We invite interested readers to take a look at all of our articles.We know that the Democratic Party leadership, along with virtually all Congressional Democrats, and particularly those of radical “Left,” are adamantly opposed to this bill. The burning $10,000.00 question, though, is this: Is the Senate Majority Leader, Mitch McConnell, also opposed to national handgun carry reciprocity? If Senator McConnell isn’t opposed to the bill, the effect of his doing nothing to move it along has the same impact as active opposition to it. Ultimately, Senator McConnell, as the Senate Majority Leader, has absolute or virtually absolute control over what bills are acted upon and what bills are not. He wields immense power. It may be, of course, that Senator McConnell having having wished for and having sought bipartisan support on this bill and, realizing he was unable to obtain it, has been resigned to simply ignoring it, thereby allowing the bill to lapse of its own accord, without action in the Senate Judiciary Committee, where it presently sits. But, what can be more important than our fundamental and unalienable rights and liberties, especially the right of the people to keep and bear arms, for the purpose of self-defense and as the ultimate fail-safe mechanism to prevent tyranny?If the American people have to wait for conditions to be “right” for passage of national handgun carry reciprocity, we may be waiting until Hell freezes over, especially with so many new radical Left elements poised to flex their muscle when the 116^th Congress takes over on January 3, 2019. That is why it is necessary to fast-track the Senate bill on this without further delay, so it can be sent to President Trump for his signature before the lame-duck Senate adjourns for the Christmas Holiday. For, if the lame-duck Senate does not act at once, all unfinished business of the 115^th Congress remains unfinished—dead—until or unless any pending bill of the previous, 115^th Congress, is reintroduced in the 116^th Congress, when Congressional business starts anew.Once the 116^th Congress commences business in January 2019, however, you can forget about passage of national handgun carry reciprocity and you can forget about passage of any other bill that serves to strengthen the Second Amendment. For, if there is one thing Congressional Democrats—who will seat a majority in the the House of Representatives—will focus their energies on, apart from continuing their effort to undermine President Trump, and apart from their singular objective to open our Southern border to thousands, more, of illegal aliens, it is their single-minded desire and goal to weaken the Second Amendment. And, they seek to accomplish that through federal Statute, to the point that the right embodied in the Second Amendment becomes essentially non-existent.Remember, this: no bill becomes law unless both Houses of Congress agree on passage of a bill and the U.S. President then signs the bill into law. It is reasonable to assume that a Democratic Party majority in the House of Representatives will have no incentive to strengthen the Second Amendment—and this is no understatement. So, if national handgun carry reciprocity, which passed the Republican controlled House in 2017, does not see passage in the Senate now, it will go nowhere, in 2019.The newly reconfirmed Democratic Party House Speaker Nancy Pelosi—will likely never allow national handgun carry reciprocity, or any other Pro-Second Amendment bill, to make it to the Floor of the House for debate and for a vote by the full House even if a Republican House member reintroduces national handgun carry reciprocity in 2019. And, if for some reason Nancy Pelosi, were to allow debate and a roll-call vote of a new national handgun carry reciprocity measure on the Floor of the House in 2019 or 2020, it would only happen if she knew the bill would fail and, of course, she would want the bill to fail, as she is a fierce opponent of the individual right embodied in the Second Amendment.Time is therefore of the essence. If we are to see national handgun carry reciprocity, the Senate must act promptly on the bill that passed the House under Representative Paul Ryan, and which is now and has been suspended in the Senate Committee on the Judiciary.Ammoland Shooting Sports News and The Truth About Guns  immediately posted, on their websites, our article calling for Americans to urge the Senate to act on the bill the Senate has been sitting on for almost a year. And it is a top story. If you do a search on Google, using the phrase, “national handgun carry,” you will see also that the Arbalest Quarrel article, as it appears on Ammoland Shooting Sports News, has the number one spot, and the article has held that spot for several days.The Arbalest Quarrel continues to reach out to Pro-Second Amendment organizations and to responsible social media and news sources to mount a last-ditch grass-roots effort for passage of the “Concealed Carry Reciprocity Act of 2017.”Over the past few days, we have made substantial progress and hope remains. We trust that thousands of American citizens have responded to our plea and have made calls to Senators Mitch McConnell and Charles Grassley, and that they have contacted NRA and the White House, too. And, we know that thousands of Americans who cherish their sacred Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms have responded with their views and comments on Pro-Second Amendment websites and social media to get the word out. Your message to Senate Republicans should be clear and clearly expressed: “If you want my vote, pass national concealed handgun carry reciprocity now!” “Votes” are one thing that all politicians know well and are sensitive to.The Arbalest Quarrel is doing its part. To further this important and timely matter. The President of the Arbalest Quarrel, Stephen L. D'Andrilli, sent a letter to Vice President Mike Pence, asking the Vice President to urge President Trump to call the Senate Majority Leader, Mitch McConnell, urging Senator McConnell to hold a full Senate Roll-Call vote on the bill, before the Senate adjourns for the Christmas Holiday, and the business of the 115th Congress ends.The content of that letter which was sent on official Arbalest Quarrel letterhead, on Tuesday, November 27, 2018, via Priority FedEx Overnight, is as follows:________________________________________________November 27, 2018                                 via FedEx Priority OvernightThe Vice President of the United States The White HouseOffice of the Vice President1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W. Washington, DC 20500Re: National Concealed Handgun Carry ReciprocityDear Mr. Vice President:I had the distinct honor and privilege of meeting and talking with you at the 2014 annual convention of the NRA, in Indianapolis, and, once again, a year later, at the Grand Hyatt Hotel in New York City, where you were a guest speaker at the New York Meeting. This coming April 2019, I will be attending the NRA Convention that will be held once again in Indianapolis.I am aware that a central plank of the Democratic Party leadership is directed to destruction of the Second Amendment-the surest path to tyranny if the Democratic Party succeeds. So, the best way to derail the Democratic Party's efforts is to strengthen the Second Amendment. It is essentially for this reason that I am writing to you, and I am doing so out of a sense of urgency, as time is of the essence.Almost one year ago, the Republican controlled House voted for passage of 115 H.R. 38, "Concealed Carry Reciprocity Act of 2017. "The House passed the bill on December 6, 2017, and it was immediately sent to the Senate for action. If Senate Majority Leader, Mitch McConnell, had pushed for passage of the bill, I feel certain it would have passed in the Republican controlled Senate. But, inexplicably, and disturbingly, the bill has lied dormant in the Senate Judiciary Committee, for almost a year.A Democratic Party controlled House will likely not allow for passage of a bill for national concealed handgun carry reciprocity. So, any attempt by Senate Republicans to resurrect the bill in a Republican controlled Senate, when the new Congress commences business, on January 3, 2019, will be futile. We therefore have only a small window of opportunity remaining before the Senate recess. This is why the Senate must pass this measure without delay and present it to President Trump for his signature, before the Senate adjourns on December 14, 2018.On our website, the Arbalest Quarrel, have discussed the importance of moving this bill through the Senate, while Republicans control both Houses of Congress. The link to our article is: We invite both you and President Trump to review our article and to act on this.Nothing has more importance to me than the sacred rights and liberties set forth in our Constitution, and the preservation of our way of life, grounded in the Judea-Christian ethic. Both are under constant assault by Leftist elements inside our Country and outside it, and by our purported "free" Press.As President Trump has made support of the Second Amendment an important part of his campaign, national handgun carry reciprocity would stand as his most important achievement in safeguarding the individual's natural right of self-defense with a firearm. And, too, defending the Second Amendment through passage of this bill will demonstrate to millions of American citizens the veracity of the President ' s promises, the value of his word, and the strength of the President's will to complete what he sets out to do.I respectfully request you urge President Trump to call upon Senator McConnell to hold a Senate floor roll-call vote on national handgun carry reciprocity before the Senate adjourns on December 14, 2018.I welcome the opportunity to assist further in this matter. Please do not hesitate to contact me if I may be of help. Thank you very much.Respectfully submitted, _______________________________________________________________Time is of the essence. The fight is not over. Right-To-Carry nationwide is still possible. Keep in mind what the late Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. said: “A right delayed is a right denied.” And, many of you may recall the profound witticism of the late, great New York Yankees baseball catcher, Yogi Berra: “It ain’t over till it’s over.”Please do your part, if you haven't already acted, to help make National Concealed Handgun Carry Reciprocity the Law of the Land.  Whether it's one or two phone calls or a quick text message, doing something is better than doing nothing. The fate of national handgun carry reciprocity and the fate of our fundamental, natural right, etched in stone in the Second Amendment, is ultimately in your hands._________________________________________________Copyright © 2018 Roger J Katz (Towne Criour), Stephen L. D’Andrilli (Publius) All Rights Reserved.

ATTENTION ALL LAW-ABIDING GUN OWNERS: NATIONAL CONCEALED HANDGUN CARRY RECIPROCITY IS IN JEOPARDY.

Concealed handgun carry reciprocity is about to die. It is about to die through deliberate inaction or callous indifference of the U.S. Senate. But we have a small window of opportunity: 21 days left to achieve the goal that has eluded us for years. It seemed assured of being accomplished by the Republican controlled 115^th Congress but, it wasn’t.Congress still has time to act before the end of the year, but that does nothing to explain why Congress failed to get this done. It certainly had ample opportunity to do so.

WHAT HAPPENED? WHY DID A REPUBLICAN CONTROLLED CONGRESS FAIL TO FULFILL PRESIDENT TRUMP’S SIGNATURE CAMPAIGN PROMISE?

The House of Representatives and the Senate did introduce several national handgun carry reciprocity bills in the last two years. One such bill was 115 H.R. 38, titled, “Concealed Carry Reciprocity Act of 2017. The bill's synopsis reads: “AN ACT to amend title 18, United States Code, to provide a means by which nonresidents of a State whose residents may carry concealed firearms may also do so in the State.” The measure was voted on by the full House, and the Republican controlled House passed the bill, on December 6, 2017, by recorded roll call vote: 231 to 198. The vast majority of House Democrats voted against passage of the bill. Only 6 of 184 Democrats voted for passage of the bill. Contrariwise, the vast majority of House Republicans, 225, voted for passage of the bill; and 14 voted against passage.One day later, on December 7, 2017, the bill was sent to and received by the Senate, where it was read twice, in accordance with Senate protocol, and referred to the Senate Committee on the Judiciary for action. And, then we heard—Nothing! Dead Silence!The bill apparently fell into a deep, dark abyss.Senator Mitch McConnell, who, as Senate Majority Leader, has ultimate authority for determining what bills are voted on by the full Senate, said and did nothing to get the Judiciary Committee to act so that the bill could be voted on by the full Senate.Why didn’t the Judiciary Committee act on this? They certainly could have, but didn’t. And, why didn’t Senator Mitch McConnell urge the Judiciary Committee to action, so the full Senate would have had the opportunity to vote for passage of national concealed handgun carry legislation? We don’t know. He could have seen to this, but didn’t. Senate Republicans who can answer these questions, aren’t saying.Much about this, we don’t know. It is deeply perplexing.

BUT, THIS MUCH WE DO KNOW—

Senator Mitch McConnell can get things done when he wants to. Senator Mitch McConnell was able to get Judge Brett Kavanaugh confirmed as Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court. This wasn’t easy, given the strenuous pushback by Senate Democrats. And the Senator should be commended for his zealous, unflagging effort in that regard. He should be just as zealous in getting national concealed handgun legislation through the full Senate. He certainly could have done so. For some reason, he chose not to. Yet, he still has time to get this done before the 116^th Congress begins its first term, on January 3, 2019, because, at that point, it would be futile. The House will seat a Democratic Party majority; and the Democratic Party leadership's agenda will include the drafting of bills to restrict the right of the people to keep and bear arms, not to strengthen that basic, fundamental, natural, and unalienable rightThe 2016 general election earned us President Donald Trump along with Republican majorities in both Houses of Congress. National Right-to-Carry was in our grasp. The timing couldn’t have been better. This is what law-abiding gun owners wanted, and NRA and other Pro-Second Amendment organizations campaigned vigorously for it. Our once-in-a-lifetime real hope for National Right-to-Carry is now slipping through our fingers.The Senate had over a year to act on the bill, from late 2017, when it first received the bill from the House. But the Senate failed to act.

CAN’T THE SENATE SIMPLY PASS THE BILL NEXT YEAR AND SEND IT ON TO PRESIDENT TRUMP FOR HIS SIGNATURE IN 2019?

NO! IT CANNOT! All pending bills die.“At the end of a two-year session, Congress adjourns 'sine die' or 'without day' and not reconvene until a new Congress starts some time the next January.After that, the slate is wiped clean; there is no business pending. All of the ‘H.R.’ and ‘S.’ numbered titles that have been discussed and debated for the past two years will be archived. When Congress reconvenes, the process starts all over again.” When Congress reconvenes in 2019, House Republicans can reintroduce concealed handgun carry reciprocity but with a Democratic Party House of Representatives majority, the bill would never pass. So, whatever the Senate does in 2019, won’t matter because both Houses of Congress must pass a bill before a bill is sent to the President for his signature, at which point, a bill then becomes the Law of the Land, in accordance with Article 1, Section 7 of the U.S. Constitution.

TIME TO PASS CONCEALED HANDGUN CARRY RECIPROCITY IS OF THE ESSENCE!

There is no time to waste. The Senate is scheduled to adjourn on December 14, 2018. If the Senate fails to pass the bill by emergency roll call vote, we will have lost the only real opportunity to see concealed handgun carry reciprocity through to fruition.And, keep in mind: the Senate’s failure to act on national handgun carry places extreme pressure on President Trump who made this issue one of the signature issues of his campaign for U.S. President. Failure to accomplish this goal can well lead to Trump’s defeat in the general U.S. Presidential election of 2020. We must place the Senate’s feet to the fire.” This is where you can help!

WHAT CAN YOU DO?

IMMEDIATELY CALL:U.S. Senator Chuck Grassley (Chairman of the Judiciary Committee): (202) 224-3744U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell: (202) 224-2541Your Senate Delegation: (202) 224-3121TELL THEM THIS:“The Senate must vote on the Concealed Carry Reciprocity Act of 2017 bill immediately. The bill passed the House on December 6, 2017, almost one year ago, and has since been stalled in the Senate Judiciary Committee. That is unacceptable! We have only a few precious weeks to get this matter completed. The Senate must pass this bill and send it immediately to the President for his signature. President Trump will sign the bill into law, fulfilling an important campaign promise. My continued support for you will depend on your vote to approve this bill.”You should also contact NRA and President Trump, reminding them of their commitment to support national concealed handgun carry reciprocity. The contact numbers are as follows:The White House: (202) 456-1111 or (202) 456-1414National Rifle Association (NRA): (800) 672-3888We must put pressure on those who can get this matter accomplished.Making a few important phone calls will only take a few minutes of your time. It is quick and easy, and critically important to safeguard and strengthen our right to keep and bear arms.What you do can make a difference and you will be proud to have taken an active part in protecting our natural, fundamental, unalienable, and sacred right to safeguard our lives and the lives of those closest to us, with the best means available: a firearm.If you chose to do nothing, you will only have yourself to blame.THIS IS OUR LAST REAL SHOT AT PASSAGE OF SIGNIFICANT PRO-SECOND AMENDMENT LEGISLATION!DON’T HESITATE TO TAKE THE SHOT. YOU WILL REGRET IT BECAUSE IT MAY BE YOUR LAST!__________________________________________________Copyright © 2018 Roger J Katz (Towne Criour), Stephen L. D’Andrilli (Publius) All Rights Reserved.

UNITED STATES SAFE ACT IN THE MAKING: PENNED AND PENCILED BY ANDREW CUOMO

GUN RIGHTS STAY CENTER STAGE

With the midterm Congressional and Gubernatorial elections just around the corner, those Americans who support a strong Second Amendment must not sit idle, but must vote for Congressional candidates and State Governors who will not only support the right of the people to keep and bear arms but who will actively defend that right against those who dare to destroy it. The gun rights issue is of paramount importance and will take center stage if Cuomo Democrats win control of the House and Senate and if they take control of the States.

DESTRUCTION OF THE SECOND AMENDMENT REMAINS AT THE TOP OF THE LIST FOR CUOMO DEMOCRATS.

The Arbalest Quarrel has pointed out in our article, posted on August 1, 2018, that, although the immigration issue has been hyped by the mainstream media and by leftist politicians, in recent weeks and months, it is the Second Amendment that remains first and foremost, firmly in the crosshairs of those who seek to undermine our sacred Bill of Rights. And, sure enough, the exercise of gun rights is once again in the antigun zealots’ crosshairs.In recent days, as the Governor of New York, Andrew M. Cuomo, gears up for a third term bid, he has taken direct aim at the oldest Civil Rights Organization in the Country, the NRA. NRA exists to defend the single, most important right of the American people, the right of the people to keep and bear arms—a right critical to the safeguarding of a free Republic, and critical to guaranteeing the autonomy and sanctity of the individual citizen, as the true sovereign authority in and of the United States.The New York Times has taken the lead in shepherding New York residents to elect Cuomo to a third term in Office, making the point of telling the public, in an August 5, 2018 article, titled, “A New Brawl With the N.R.A.? Cuomo Seizes an Opportunity as a Primary Looms”— that “Mr. Cuomo has had a longstanding ideological commitment to gun control. . . [and that] in 2013, Mr. Cuomo successfully fought for passage of the Safe Act, making New York the first state to enact more stringent gun regulations after the Sandy Hook massacre. He has proudly touted his ‘F’ rating from the N.R.A.” Lest there be any doubt where Cuomo’s ultimate ambition lies, the New York Times adds, in that same article, that “he [Cuomo] has also made no secret of his belief that his actions on gun control have made his state a model for the nation—a handy argument for a politician who has garnered some mention as a possible 2020 candidate. ‘Use New York as a test case,’ Mr. Cuomo said in an interview of his gun control measures, including the Safe Act. ‘The state is a laboratory of democracy where I can say: We passed the law five years ago. Come look at our state.’”Come look at New York, indeed! Imagine, if you will, a Nation, where the model for gun control, the New York Safe Act, becomes federal law—thrust on every State in the Union.De Facto, if not outright de jure, repeal of the Second Amendment has been the goal of the Democratic Party for decades. And, Andrew Cuomo will lead the charge on eviscerating the Second Amendment. Long before Democrats changed their position on illegal immigration—calling at an earlier time for curbs on such immigration, but now extolling an open borders policy that would essentially open the floodgates, letting flow, like an angry river into this Country, tens, perhaps even hundreds, of millions of low-skilled migrants, along with a large contingent of criminal gangs and refugees from failed states of the Middle East—Democrats have never wavered but have consistently attacked the sacred, natural right codified in the Second Amendment. They have done so incessantly, unceasingly, vehemently. That single issue is what defines them. That single issue is what motivates them, like no other. For, they know that: once the right of the people to keep and bear arms is destroyed, they--these Cuomo Democrats and other leftists--will do away with other fundamental rights and liberties. In so doing, they contrive and machinate to contort our Nation into a thing unrecognizable, an entity completely alien to the aims and desires of the founders of a Free Republic. These Cuomo Democrats seek to create a quagmire, a geographical "Place," no longer an Independent, Sovereign Nation--but merely a place--overrun by unassimilable alien people. These Cuomo Democrats and other leftists who seek to destroy our Nation--a Nation founded on natural rights and liberties--intend to destroy the very fabric of our Nation: its memory; its history, its values, its culture, its ethos. They intend to wipe the slate clean. And, to assist them in their detestable endeavor, they conspire to bring into our Country, such denizens of other Countries who have no understanding of, no appreciation for and, in fact, no concept, of a Nation that exists under and by the will of the people alone--a Nation whose people are endowed by their Creator with fundamental, natural rights and liberties--rights and liberties intrinsic to their very being: incorruptible, immutable, beyond the power of Government to deny, to ignore, to erase.

CUOMO DEMOCRATS DO NOT PERCEIVE THE BILL OF RIGHTS AS CODIFYING NATURAL RIGHTS BUT AS A CREATION OF MAN THAT CAN, THEREFORE, BE AMENDED OR DELETED AT WILL.

Not surprisingly, Cuomo Democrats and other leftists' disdain for the Second Amendment is reflected in their rebuke of the very notion that the Bill of Rights embodies and codifies a set of basic, natural rights endowed to man by the Creator, intrinsic to man's very being. As Cuomo Democrats and other leftists savagely, mindlessly, mercilessly attack the right of the people to keep and bear arms of the Second Amendment, they have also attacked the right of free speech, codified in the First Amendment, and they have attacked the very notion of private property rights codified in the Fifth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. They consider these rights trivial, anachronistic to, and an anathema to the "new" Socialist Order they wish to create. In their scheme, these Cuomo Democrats, and these other leftists residing in our Nation, consider the Nation's sacred rights to be merely man-made conventions, capable of excision or rescission, at the stroke of the pen.Thus, these Cuomo Democrats and these other leftists belittle the Nation's Bill of Rights, and belittle, too, and especially, the right of the people to keep and bear arms. At every turn these Cuomo Democrats and these other leftists contrive to undermine the sanctity of our sacred rights. In their insidious design first to trivialize the Nation's fundamental rights--natural rights, codified in the Nation's Bill of Rights by the framers of our Constitution--they seek, second, eventually, to strike these fundamental, natural rights from the Constitution, substituting for them, such man-made rights, they happen to construct for the moment; rights that happen, for the moment, to comprise their wish list, consistent with and commensurate with their plans for a new Socialist Order they intend to impose on Americans.And what are some of these new rights? Investor Business Daily wrote, presciently, in 2016, that: “They [Democrats] talk about the ‘right to affordable health care,’ the ‘right to a college education,’ the ‘right to a livable wage.’ But at the same time, many of these same Democrats have been agitating to restrict or outright repeal existing rights enshrined in the Constitution's Bill of Rights.” 

CONSERVATIVE COMMENTATORS MUST SPEAK OUT!

Conservative commentators must speak out against the perils of a Congress controlled by the Democratic Party, and they must do so continuously. They must emphasize the threat that Cuomo Democrats and other leftists pose to the continued sanctity of and continuity of the Bill of Rights and, especially, the threat they pose to the Second Amendment.Yet, conservative commentators remain, for the most part, reticent. Oddly, even the conservative commentator Sean Hannity fails to mention that Cuomo Democrats would strive to weaken the Second Amendment if they gained control of the House and the Senate. On his nightly Fox news broadcasts, Hannity rightly warns the American public about specific dangers posed by a Democratic Party takeover of Congress, including Democrats’ intention to impeach President Trump and their commitment to an open borders immigration policy, but he says nothing about Cuomo led Democrats’ devious, scurrilous plans to enact restrictive firearms measures, on the National stage, in the event they take over the House, and, possibly, the Senate as well.

IS THE WRITING ON THE WALL?

If Democrats do in fact take over Congress, after the November 2018 midterm elections, and if Andrew Cuomo is elected to a third term as Governor of New York, Cuomo will be taking his plans for a National New York Safe Act to a receptive Congress, where he will lead the pack to destroy the right of the people to keep and bear arms. Of that, there can be no doubt._________________________________________________Copyright © 2018 Roger J Katz (Towne Criour), Stephen L. D’Andrilli (Publius) All Rights Reserved.