Sometimes it comes down to how much you want something.
Enough to interrupt and change your routine, or just enough to shrug your shoulders, and sigh "Oh Well."
Lawrence O’Donnell has challenged us to stop taking congressional obstruction in stride, and to start calling our Senators and giving them a piece of our outrage.
Not a bad idea. He even made it Tweetable, given the way social media works these days.
O’Donnell: The assault weapons ban is not dead
by Nick Ramsey, msnbc.com -- 03/21/2013
[...]
In his latest Rewrite segment, MSNBC’s Lawrence O’Donnell said, “There was going to be a vote on the assault weapons ban on the Senate floor whether Harry Reid included it or not. What we know now is that vote will be up to Dianne Feinstein. If she offers it on the Senate floor (as an amendment) and fights for it, there’s a chance — there’s always a chance it could pass.”
O’Donnell said it will take voters calling and emailing their senators to encourage them to stand with Senator Feinstein. O’Donnell encouraged Twitter users to use the hashtag #StandWithDianne.
If you care about the assault weapons ban, and you can tweet with the best of them, let the world know
WHY limiting the weapons of war to 10 blasts at a time is vitally important, given the brave new world we now live,
and sometimes randomly die, in.
Let them be, our wake up call ...
larger image -- Source: The Angels of Newtown | Social Notz
Here's some water-cooler trivia -- some facts that most gun absolutists do not know.
It's what Senator Diane Feinstein was trying to explain to the Senator Ted Cruz, about our rights, freedoms, and the Constitutional process:
Legislatures write the laws. The Supreme Court rules on their legality. The current Administration tries to enforce them and carry them out.
Here's what DiFi was trying to explain to the new resident blockhead TeddieC ...
"The Heller decision clearly points out three exceptions ..."
.
.
.
District of Columbia v. Heller - 07-290 (2008) -- supreme.justia.com
[...]
1.(f) [...]
United States v. Miller, 307 U. S. 174, does not limit the right to keep and bear arms to militia purposes, but rather limits the type of weapon to which the right applies to those used by the militia, i.e., those in common use for lawful purposes. Pp. 47–54.
2. Like most rights, the Second Amendment right is not unlimited. It is not a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose: For example, concealed weapons prohibitions have been upheld under the Amendment or state analogues. The Court’s opinion should not be taken to cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, or laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings, or laws imposing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms.
[...]
In those two Scalia-penned paragraphs, the
Mr Constitutional Conservative outlined several "legal exceptions" where gun ownership
could be "
constitutionally" constrained. In outline form, they are:
1) limits the type of weapon;
2) concealed weapons prohibitions;
3) prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill;
4) forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings;
5) laws imposing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms;
[Shorter still,
the Scaila Supreme Court says these are OK: Bazooka Bans; Licensing; Competence; Locality; Gun-sale Registration & Supplier constraints.]
Who knew?
Senator Feinstein knew. Now you do too.
#StandWithDianne
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The Heller case was about the blanket ban on handguns and the requirement of trigger-locks on the remaining "allowed" guns, in the possession of the residents of Washington DC. In this case, the conservative-opinion won a 5-4 Supreme Court decision, led by Antonin Scalia, and ruled these local DC gun constraints were "unconstitutional."
Although the SCOTUS in 2008, ruled that those 2 Washington DC ordinances went too far, and struck down their legality -- they also ruled that several exceptions to the 2nd Amendment were allowable and well-supported by a long history of preceding Supreme Court rulings.
SO even, fellow-Cheney duck-hunter Scalia penned into current legislative stone:
The Second Amendment right is not unlimited.
The Absolutists have a hard time, come to terms with that one. It kind of makes them want to "blast something." ...
Off to the Duck pond ...
#StandWithDianne
It's time for some Supreme Court-sanctioned sanity, time for that to be extended to our current legislative-circus process. Because according to the Constitution --THEY -- the three-ring-leaders -- are supposed to doing OUR Business -- Not Wayne's.
Enough already. It's time to take a stand for sanity. Put it on your "To Do list."