"2nd Amendment is not a Second Class Right"

Discussion in 'Freedom and Liberty' started by RightHand, May 20, 2016.


  1. RightHand

    RightHand Been There, Done That RIP 4/15/21 Moderator Moderator Emeritus Founding Member

    We're getting hit from so many sides at the same time it's difficult to fend off the blows

    Alameda County, California enacted an ordinance that stated a "gun store must be located at least 500 feet away from any residentially-zoned district, elementary, middle or high school, pre-school, day care center, another firearms retailer or an establishment where liquor is sold or served."

    When challenged in the courts, The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in favor of the plaintiffs (Teixeira, et al. v. County of Alameda) who had been barred from opening their establishment. The plaintiffs proved, through the use of Geographic Information System (GIS) that no parcel of land in the county could meet the ordinance's mandates. (http://dailycaller.com/2016/05/16/ninth-circuit-rules-in-favor-of-california-gun-store/)

    In addition to the obvious, my reason for bring this up is the need for our constant attention to proposed legislation, even within our communities. Zoning regulations that prevent porn shops and liquor stores from locating within a short walking distance from schools may be reasonable so the next step is to add a gun store to the list although in my opinion, the gun store offers the least danger of the three.

    Nonetheless, I'm pretty sure this ordinance was discussed at the council meeting and passes without any effort, after all, it doesn't sound unreasonably restrictive. Until....someone really looks into what the end result will be. In this case, it effectively restricted ANY gun store from locating within Alameda County.

    In writing the majority opinion, Judge Diarmuid O'Scannlain equated the ordinance to our right to vote. If we have the right to vote but there are no voting machines, paper ballots, or other means of casting a vote, the right to vote itself beomes moot.

    There are endless demands on our time making it a near impossibility to monitor everything, and that is exactly what the gun control advocates are relying on.
     
    Last edited: May 20, 2016
  2. Yard Dart

    Yard Dart Vigilant Monkey Moderator

    The tearing down and eventual elimination of our rights, will not come in one fell swoop of the ax via the hands of our government.... but the death of & revoking of our Constitutional Rights, via a thousand legislative cuts...... that is their goal. Keep your eye on the hand you can not see... it is not magic what they are doing.... it is outright deception. And before you know what has happened, you will be in the shackles of our governments choosing. If you look closely now at the world directly around you.... what can you personally do, that is not regulated, taxed or monitored in some form?!
     
  3. RightHand

    RightHand Been There, Done That RIP 4/15/21 Moderator Moderator Emeritus Founding Member

    Exactly YD. Your comment reminded me of the words of Kitty Werthmann that I included in one of my blog posts on Tales of Liberty

    We Must be the Guardians of Our Liberty
    July 4, 2013


    In Celebration of Independence

    When we were all in school, our least favorite thing to do was remember dates but stay with me a minute, I do have a point. Although you will NOT be tested on the dates, at no time in history has it been more important to remember the principles.

    Following 442 days of Revolution, on July 4, 1776, the Continental Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence in which it proclaimed our freedom from the rule of Great Britain and its king and marked the expansion of the American War for Independence to achieve this goal. The Revolution lasted from 1775 until 1783 and was supported by only 3% of the colonists. Fast forward to 1787. Because of his eloquence, Thomas Jefferson was tasked with the actual writing of the constitutional document and although there was some disagreement among the representatives as to the content, the Continental Congress adopted our Constitution on September 17, a full eleven years after the signing of the Declaration of Independence. The first 10 amendments, known collectively as the Bill of Rights, weren’t ratified until four years later on December 17, 1791. Cumulatively these three documents asserted our belief in self determination, defined our representative form of government, and enumerated the constraints on that same government. These documents wisely guaranteed one single freedom – the freedom from an over zealous, tyrannical government.

    And now to my point: It took 16 years and the death or wounding of 50,000 American and French, as well as British and German troops to bring us from being subjects of the British Crown to being citizens of the United States with rights and freedoms that were not meant to be taken from us…EVER.

    So here we are in 2013 once again gathering in recognition and celebration of the very freedoms under which we were born, thanks to the courage of men and women over 200 years ago, and I am led to wonder if we have the same courage to protect and defend those principles for which our forefathers were willing to fight and die?

    The loss of rights does not usually happen with one single defining moment but rather creep over our lives like a primordial ooze. I came across words written by Kitty Werthmann, Austrian by birth. American by choice. “She survived Hitler and wants to warns America.” I believe that these words should be printed and posted in every office, train station, bus station, school, library, and public bathroom across our country and read to our children at least once a year. July 4th seems a perfect time to start a tradition.

    This is Mrs. Werthmann’s warning

    “I am a witness to history.

    “I cannot tell you that Hitler took Austria by tanks and guns; it would distort history.

    If you remember the plot of the Sound of Music, the Von Trapp family escaped over the Alps rather than submit to the Nazis. Kitty wasn’t so lucky. Her family chose to stay in her native Austria. She was 10 years old, but bright and aware. And she was watching.

    “We elected him by a landslide – 98 percent of the vote,” she recalls.

    She wasn’t old enough to vote in 1938 – approaching her 11th birthday. But she remembers.

    “Everyone thinks that Hitler just rolled in with his tanks and took Austria by force.”

    No so.

    Hitler is welcomed to Austria

    “In 1938, Austria was in deep Depression. Nearly one-third of our workforce was unemployed. We had 25 percent inflation and 25 percent bank loan interest rates.

    Farmers and business people were declaring bankruptcy daily. Young people were going from house to house begging for food. Not that they didn’t want to work; there simply weren’t any jobs.

    “My mother was a Christian woman and believed in helping people in need. Every day we cooked a big kettle of soup and baked bread to feed those poor, hungry people – about 30 daily.’

    “We looked to our neighbor on the north, Germany, where Hitler had been in power since 1933.” she recalls. “We had been told that they didn’t have unemployment or crime, and they had a high standard of living.

    “Nothing was ever said about persecution of any group – Jewish or otherwise. We were led to believe that everyone in Germany was happy. We wanted the same way of life in Austria. We were promised that a vote for Hitler would mean the end of unemployment and help for the family. Hitler also said that businesses would be assisted, and farmers would get their farms back.

    “Ninety-eight percent of the population voted to annex Austria to Germany and have Hitler for our ruler.

    “We were overjoyed,” remembers Kitty, “and for three days we danced in the streets and had candlelight parades. The new government opened up big field kitchens and everyone was fed.

    “After the election, German officials were appointed, and, like a miracle, we suddenly had law and order. Three or four weeks later, everyone was employed. The government made sure that a lot of work was created through the Public Work Service.

    “Hitler decided we should have equal rights for women. Before this, it was a custom that married Austrian women did not work outside the home. An able-bodied husband would be looked down on if he couldn’t support his family. Many women in the teaching profession were elated that they could retain the jobs they previously had been required to give up for marriage.

    “Then we lost religious education for kids

    “Our education was nationalized. I attended a very good public school.. The population was predominantly Catholic, so we had religion in our schools. The day we elected Hitler (March 13, 1938), I walked into my schoolroom to find the crucifix replaced by Hitler’s picture hanging next to a Nazi flag. Our teacher, a very devout woman, stood up and told the class we wouldn’t pray or have religion anymore. Instead, we sang ‘Deutschland, Deutschland, Uber Alles,’ and had physical education.

    “Sunday became National Youth Day with compulsory attendance. Parents were not pleased about the sudden change in curriculum. They were told that if they did not send us, they would receive a stiff letter of warning the first time. The second time they would be fined the equivalent of $300, and the third time they would be subject to jail.”

    And then things got worse.

    “The first two hours consisted of political indoctrination. The rest of the day we had sports. As time went along, we loved it. Oh, we had so much fun and got our sports equipment free.

    “We would go home and gleefully tell our parents about the wonderful time we had.

    “My mother was very unhappy,” remembers Kitty. “When the next term started, she took me out of public school and put me in a convent. I told her she couldn’t do that and she told me that someday when I grew up, I would be grateful. There was a very good curriculum, but hardly any fun – no sports, and no political indoctrination.

    “I hated it at first but felt I could tolerate it. Every once in a while, on holidays, I went home. I would go back to my old friends and ask what was going on and what they were doing.

    “Their loose lifestyle was very alarming to me. They lived without religion. By that time, unwed mothers were glorified for having a baby for Hitler.

    “It seemed strange to me that our society changed so suddenly. As time went along, I realized what a great deed my mother did so that I wasn’t exposed to that kind of humanistic philosophy.

    “In 1939, the war started, and a food bank was established. All food was rationed and could only be purchased using food stamps. At the same time, a full-employment law was passed which meant if you didn’t work, you didn’t get a ration card, and, if you didn’t have a card, you starved to death.

    “Women who stayed home to raise their families didn’t have any marketable skills and often had to take jobs more suited for men.

    “Soon after this, the draft was implemented.

    “It was compulsory for young people, male and female, to give one year to the labor corps,” remembers Kitty. “During the day, the girls worked on the farms, and at night they returned to their barracks for military training just like the boys.

    “They were trained to be anti-aircraft gunners and participated in the signal corps. After the labor corps, they were not discharged but were used in the front lines.

    “When I go back to Austria to visit my family and friends, most of these women are emotional cripples because they just were not equipped to handle the horrors of combat.

    “Three months before I turned 18, I was severely injured in an air raid attack. I nearly had a leg amputated, so I was spared having to go into the labor corps and into military service.

    “When the mothers had to go out into the work force, the government immediately established child care centers.

    “You could take your children ages four weeks old to school age and leave them there around-the-clock, seven days a week, under the total care of the government.

    “The state raised a whole generation of children. There were no motherly women to take care of the children, just people highly trained in child psychology. By this time, no one talked about equal rights. We knew we had been had.

    “Before Hitler, we had very good medical care. Many American doctors trained at the University of Vienna..

    “After Hitler, health care was socialized, free for everyone. Doctors were salaried by the government. The problem was, since it was free, the people were going to the doctors for everything.

    “When the good doctor arrived at his office at 8 a.m., 40 people were already waiting and, at the same time, the hospitals were full.

    “If you needed elective surgery, you had to wait a year or two for your turn. There was no money for research as it was poured into socialized medicine. Research at the medical schools literally stopped, so the best doctors left Austria and emigrated to other countries.

    “As for healthcare, our tax rates went up to 80 percent of our income. Newlyweds immediately received a $1,000 loan from the government to establish a household. We had big programs for families.

    “All day care and education were free. High schools were taken over by the government and college tuition was subsidized. Everyone was entitled to free handouts, such as food stamps, clothing, and housing.

    “We had another agency designed to monitor business. My brother-in-law owned a restaurant that had square tables.

    “Government officials told him he had to replace them with round tables because people might bump themselves on the corners. Then they said he had to have additional bathroom facilities. It was just a small dairy business with a snack bar. He couldn’t meet all the demands.

    “Soon, he went out of business. If the government owned the large businesses and not many small ones existed, it could be in control.

    “We had consumer protection, too

    “We were told how to shop and what to buy. Free enterprise was essentially abolished. We had a planning agency specially designed for farmers. The agents would go to the farms, count the livestock, and then tell the farmers what to produce, and how to produce it.

    “In 1944, I was a student teacher in a small village in the Alps. The villagers were surrounded by mountain passes which, in the winter, were closed off with snow, causing people to be isolated.

    “So people intermarried and offspring were sometimes retarded. When I arrived, I was told there were 15 mentally retarded adults, but they were all useful and did good manual work.

    “I knew one, named Vincent, very well. He was a janitor of the school. One day I looked out the window and saw Vincent and others getting into a van.

    “I asked my superior where they were going. She said to an institution where the State Health Department would teach them a trade, and to read and write. The families were required to sign papers with a little clause that they could not visit for 6 months.

    “They were told visits would interfere with the program and might cause homesickness.

    “As time passed, letters started to dribble back saying these people died a natural, merciful death. The villagers were not fooled. We suspected what was happening. Those people left in excellent physical health and all died within 6 months. We called this euthanasia.

    “Next came gun registration. People were getting injured by guns. Hitler said that the real way to catch criminals (we still had a few) was by matching serial numbers on guns. Most citizens were law-abiding and dutifully marched to the police station to register their firearms. Not long afterwards, the police said that it was best for everyone to turn in their guns. The authorities already knew who had them, so it was futile not to comply voluntarily.

    “No more freedom of speech. Anyone who said something against the government was taken away. We knew many people who were arrested, not only Jews, but also priests and ministers who spoke up.

    “Totalitarianism didn’t come quickly, it took 5 years from 1938 until 1943, to realize full dictatorship in Austria. Had it happened overnight, my countrymen would have fought to the last breath. Instead, we had creeping gradualism. Now, our only weapons were broom handles. The whole idea sounds almost unbelievable that the state, little by little eroded our freedom.”

    “This is my eyewitness account.

    “It’s true. Those of us who sailed past the Statue of Liberty came to a country of unbelievable freedom and opportunity.

    “America is truly is the greatest country in the world. “Don’t let freedom slip away.

    “After America, there is no place to go.”

    Kitty Werthmann
     
  4. Yard Dart

    Yard Dart Vigilant Monkey Moderator

    I have read Kitty's story many times!!!!

    It all begins here and ends here.........
    [​IMG]

    We the people, need to stand up and take back the power we have given to our federal "representatives".... the power lies within the people to correct the wrongs of our nation.... yet I sadly also know, that we may have crossed that tipping point.

    In which case, I follow Rogers Orders to be prepared for the worst case. ;)

    Rogers' Orders
     
  5. duane

    duane Monkey+++

    Where do you think we are on her timeline in the present USA? Education, sports, media, culture, social interactions, history, and such are all being changed. Any references to the civil war and the reasons for it, our past regional developments, our Christian background etc are being removed from the history books and our culture. Jefferson was one of the most intelligent men that ever lived and much of our traditional government was based on documents he wrote or assisted in writing, but he, like many others in his day, owned slaves and thus we must revise history and throw out his writings and replace them with some modern "liberal" system. I some how doubt that the system that the Rev. Al Sharpton wishes to set up will be as well thought out as Jefferson's and I doubt it will protect our rights or our property.
     
  6. marlas1too

    marlas1too Monkey+++

    those who don't learn from history are DOOMED to repeat it
     
    UncleMorgan and RightHand like this.
  7. Bandit99

    Bandit99 Monkey+++ Site Supporter+

    The really scary bit which gives me tinkles is, “After America, there is no place to go.”
    Wife and I were talking about what to do if Hillary wins and we came to the same conclusion...there is no place to run. Maybe Alaska but even there they would/will find you. And, most other countries you will be third-rate citizens and always suspected and certainly harassed for money and/or fun.
     
    kellory, Ganado, UncleMorgan and 3 others like this.
  8. BTPost

    BTPost Stumpy Old Fart,Deadman Walking, Snow Monkey Moderator

    Depends how far out you are willing to go..... If you need to be a "Townie" you can get about half your Liberty back... But if you go far out into the Bush, it will cost the JackBoots more than they are willing to spend to "Root" you out.... Just getting to you...
     
  9. marlas1too

    marlas1too Monkey+++

    rickr you could go into the Canadian outback
     
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  10. duane

    duane Monkey+++

    There are still places to go in the short run, but in the last 70 years of my observations, more and more are disappearing. When I was 8 years old, 1946, we had no phone, electricity, running water , etc, but also no drones, cell phone cameras, dash cams, transponders for our cars, gps trackers etc. Places where you could live a life of your own without being bothered are rapidly disappearing.
     
  11. UncleMorgan

    UncleMorgan I like peeling bananas and (occasionally) people.

    If we run and hide, they will eventually find us. If we run far and hide well, it is our children that they will eventually find. The time for running is over.
     
  12. John Grit

    John Grit Monkey

    Losing our right to own and carry and shoot guns is part of the price for allowing politicians, even begging them to do so in some cases, to expand the power of federal government way beyond what the Constitution allows. The first president to give us a federal gun law was also the first to give us Socialism. Many probably do not know that the original National Firearms Act would have included ALL types of guns, not just full autos, short barreled rifles, and shotguns. This would have made owning ANY gun far out of the reach of all but wealthy Americans. A $200 transfer tax was more than many families spent in a year at that time. Most people would have been forced to turn their guns in to avoid ten years in prison. Some families lived on less than $100 a year during the Depression. Keep in mind that millions of families fed themselves with their guns back then, along with farming and fishing. So the very first federal gun law restricting our right to own them almost completely disarmed us.

    It doesn't matter if the excuse to expand power comes from the right or the left, whether they say it's for a war effort, national defense, fighting crime, or taking care of the poor, when federal power advances, liberty is forced to retreat.
     
    Bandit99 likes this.
  13. chimo

    chimo the few, the proud, the jarhead monkey crowd

    Sad but true fact: as the population of the Bush increases, it becomes easier for the authorities to root you out.

    "Call someplace paradise, kiss it goodbye" -- Eagles: The Last Resort
     
  14. enloopious

    enloopious Rocket Surgeon

    Time to stand and fight. There are leaders out there. There are more than you all know and they are everywhere. Time to go old school and actually talk to your neighbors.
     
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