Forbes: "U.N. Agreement Should Have All Gun Owners Up In Arms"

Matt Drudge just reposted an old commentary from Forbe's on the UN's proposed "Small Arms Treaty."  The treaty that I thought was more of a boy that cried wolf story than anything else (in fact if you google you can find references to the Small Arms Treaty going a while) may be more of a threat that we previously thought.

Under the guise of a proposed global “Small Arms Treaty” premised to fight “terrorism”, “insurgency” and “international crime syndicates” you can be quite certain that an even more insidious threat is being targeted – our Constitutional right for law-abiding citizens to own and bear arms.

What, exactly, does the intended agreement entail?
While the terms have yet to be made public, if passed by the U.N. and ratified by our Senate, it will almost certainly force the U.S. to:

1. Enact tougher licensing requirements, creating additional bureaucratic red tape for legal firearms ownership.
2. Confiscate and destroy all “unauthorized” civilian firearms (exempting those owned by our government of course).
3. Ban the trade, sale and private ownership of all semi-automatic weapons (any that have magazines even though they still operate in the same one trigger pull – one single “bang” manner as revolvers, a simple fact the ant-gun media never seem to grasp).
4. Create an international gun registry, clearly setting the stage for full-scale gun confiscation.
5. In short, overriding our national sovereignty, and in the process, providing license for the federal government to assert preemptive powers over state regulatory powers guaranteed by the Tenth Amendment in addition to our Second Amendment rights. READ MORE>>>

Apparently, if passed by the UN, it will go to the Senate to be ratified.  Since the Senate has a Democratic Anti-Gun majority, we can be assured that this would pass.  The anti-gunners can't pass gun control laws now because of the pro-gun majority in the House, courts have ruled that individuals have a right to own and carry firearms, so now, they're only hope to restrict our rights is through backdoor treaty's like this one. (I'd wager that even if the UN passes this treaty many Senators wouldn't vote for it because it would amount to political suicide.)

Worse yet, George Soros has thrown his support behind the proposed UN treaty.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has announced that the Obama administration is working with the UN to lean on Congress to consent to the ATT.

Clinton has pushed the treaty as an “opportunity to promote the same high standards for the entire international community that the United States and other responsible arms exporters already have in place to ensure that weaponry is transferred for legitimate purposes.” READ MORE>>>>

 This stuff just pisses me off.

First of all, who are we to tell other nations which policies; laws; and "standards" they should enact in their own country.  We would be rioting in the street if, lets say, Saudi Arabia told us that we should have our women adopt Muslim dress standards or that we should ban alcohol because they thought it best for us.  In fact, this is exactly what this whole controversy is about.  Yes, it's about gun ownership and freedom, but its more importantly about our nation's sovereignty.  After all, why couldn't the UN pass a treaty that gets adopted by 51 airhead (and completely anti-freedom) Senators that says that the public practice of evangelizing or proselytizing should be illegal or even just regulated.


You have to love the double standard we hold regarding this notion. 

Few people understand and appreciate the truly American notion of non-interventionism.

SCOTUS Hears Arguments in Hillsboro Baptist Case

The Supreme Court is hearing the case of Albert Snyder v. Fred Phelps today.

To give a little background, Albert Snyder sued Fred Phelps (of Hillsboro Baptist Church) and won a $5 million dollar award charging that Fred Phelps was responsible for intentionally inflicting "emotional distress and violating the sanctity of the funeral of his son, Lance Corporal Mathew Snyder."  The judgement was later reversed by a federal appeals court because "despite the offensive nature of the protests... their activities were protected by the First Amendment." READ MORE>>

This is an extremely important case because a ruling on this case will have far reaching implications for all of our first amendment rights.


There is really only one issue on the table here: Does the First Amendment protect one's "right" to say something that is offensive on public property?  

We know that on private property one's free speech can be curtailed (i.e. "You can leave now or I can call the police and have them remove you for trespassing."), but if the protesters were on a public sidewalk while protesting it shouldn't make a difference whether they were saying "God Bless Our Fallen Soldiers!" or "God Hates Your Dead Son!"

Both statements reflect personal opinions of the speakers and both have been traditionally upheld as protected FREE SPEECH. 

An article in the Christian Science Monitor highlights some of the issues that are bound to arise in this case. 

Family members and others at military funerals have complained about the protests. But Phelps and his supporters insist they have a constitutional right to carry their message to the people at the funerals.
“Snyder had one (and only one) opportunity to bury his son and that occasion has been tarnished forever,” wrote Mr. Snyder’s lawyer, Sean Summers of York, Pa., in his petition urging the high court to take up the case. “Snyder deserved better. Matthew deserved better. A civilized society deserved better.”
The appeals court that reversed the jury verdict did not disagree with that point. But the appeals court said despite the “distasteful and repugnant nature of the words being challenged,” Phelps had a First Amendment right to speak on public issues, even when the speech was highly offensive.
The panel quoted a fellow appeals court judge: “Judges defending the Constitution must sometimes share [their] foxhole with scoundrels of every sort, but to abandon the post because of the poor company is to sell freedom cheaply.”
The opinion continues: “It is a fair summary of history to say that the safeguards of liberty have often been forged in controversies involving not very nice people.”

Now the question becomes can the SCOTUS defend the constitutional right for people to say what they believe even if it's offensive on public property not fearing the criticism they're bound to receive for "[sharing their] foxhole with scoundrels" who wouldn't have the decency to understand that even the dead deserve a certain amount of respect.

The implications are obvious.

• If offensive speech is not protected then who decides which speech is offensive?  
• If something offends me does that automatically make it "illegal" speech.
• Moreover, if some speech becomes "offensive" and therefore unprotected then certainly other speech is elevated as being "more important", so can the courts really decide that our constitution protects some types of political and religious speech and not others?

All in all, this could go very bad for America depending on how the SCOTUS rules.  Keep an eye on this case, and if you're religious I hope that you'll pray Free Speech (even that which you don't agree with) is defended.