Hey, Oklahoma nutbags!
Lookin' to exercise some of that God-given Right to Keep and Bear Arms?
Figurin' that - especially around April 19 - your well-regulated Militia is necessary to the security of a free State, huh?
Guessin' that it's high time you mutually pledged to each other your Lives, your Fortunes, and your sacred Honor in order to defend against a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over the state of Oklahoma?
Well, by all means, gentlemen.
And, since you have decided to take up arms against this absolute Tyranny, perhaps you would be good enough to let Facts be submitted to a candid world? You know - spell out in detail what exactly the tyrannical federal government has done to arouse your wrath? You know, like the Founding Fathers did in the Declaration of Independence, right?
Because, y'know, that's why they thought it was so important for the people to be able to keep and bear arms in a well-regulated militia - to defend against a Tyranny like King George's.
In fact, here, I'll make it easy for you: here's the list the Founders put out; I'm sure you can use it almost as-is, with just a few changes, right?:
He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.
He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.
He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.
He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.
He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:
For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:
For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:
For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences
For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:
For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.
He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.
He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.
In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury.
And I'm sure what the Obama administration is doing is EXACTLY like what King George was doing - you know, quartering troops, dissolving duly constituted governing bodies, depriving people of trials, cutting off trade with the rest of the world, unilaterally appointing judges -
Oh, and that whole "waging war against us" thing - that aggression will not stand, man.
No wonder we need to raise a militia: because that's exactly what the Founding Fathers themselves would have done if someone who's only 3/5 of a person had tried to impose his Kenyan Muslim socialist fascist Tyranny upon our great country.
. . .
Actually, somehow I doubt the Oklahoma Teabaggers would be able to come up with a list of repeated injuries and usurpations anywhere close to what the Founders enumerated.
In fact, something tells me the Oklahoma Teabaggers would be found seriously lacking when it came to any number of things the Founding Fathers did - including and especially opposing with manly firmness any invasions on the rights of the people of the United States.
. . .
A few months back, there was a story about the Southeast Republican Club of Broward County, Fla., holding an event at a shooting range wherein then-congressional candidate Robert Lowry fired at a target silhouette bearing the initials of Debbie Wasserman-Schulz, his Democratic opponent in the upcoming election.
Putting aside that warm and fuzzy thought for a moment, what truly spoke to the Republican worldview were the comments of Ed Napolitano, then head of same Southeast Republican Club. In this video, Napolitano clarifies why it is that, as far as rightwingers are concerned, elections are only a trifling nuisance. Bullets - not ballots - are what keep politicians in line:
"A strong national defense is important; the Republican Party, that's what we stand for. We also are the party that stands for gun rights. The other party wants to take your guns, and we think that everybody's got a right, given the Constitution, the Second Amendment, to bear arms. And that’s what we’re enjoying tonight . . .
"Because, as everybody knows, all across America, people are buying guns, and there’s a reason for that. We all know what that reason is . . ."
Uhh, gee, no, Ed, we don't. Can you please tell us?
"As long as we have the Second Amendment, then that is what keeps our government dealing with us. That’s what gives us the right to freedom of speech, that’s what gives us the right – freedom to assemble – because our government knows, the bottom line is, that we are armed citizenry."
Huh. And all this time, I thought it was the accountability of regular elections that kept our government dealing with us.
Well, that and lobbyist money. But I mean, you know.