The Democrats were trying to give D.C. a voting Congressman. This law violates the Constitution but it is unlikely anyone would have standing to challenge it. On the other hand, the Constitution does prohibit the federal government from taking away people's right to bear arms. Congress (or its proxy the district) has done this in the District of Columbia. The D.C. Circuit recently struck down much of the gun ban (which prohibited a person from carrying a legal gun from one room in his house to another).
So, a proposal was made that if the citizens of the District were to get an extraconstitutional Congressman they should also get the Constitutional right to bear arms. This passed and caused the bill to be pulled by the Democratic leadership.
I saw Chris Van Hollen speak yesterday. He is a smooth, lefty, Congressman from Maryland (who went to Swarthmore-go figure) and his argumen was that because the Bush administration "violated the Constitution" by prosecuting the war on terror with too much vigor for the ferocious Congressman Van Hollen it should allow this blatant violation of the Constitution that agrandizes Democrat power.
My own position is that most residential D.C. should be ceded back to Maryland. The portion of Virginia ceded to the District is now in the Old Dominion's hand and produces corrupt, lefty Congressman Jim Moran. I'm sure Maryland's receded territory could produce an even more impressive representative.
So to sum up, the Democrats pulled a bill from the floor that violated the Constitution by giving a non-state congressional representation, only because of an amendment that gave individuals the right to own guns which is protected by the Constitution. I could not make it up.
Finally, I also note that recent surveys have indicated 1/3d of the district is illiterate. It has the highest expenditures on schools per pupil outside NY. This is what happens to a land governed by Congress. Give it back to Maryland.
8 comments:
Now that JJV is safely ensconced in the 'burbs he's all for guns in the District. Shameful.
I am for guns everywhere there are criminals who threaten the populace and government that ocillates between being unresponsive and tyrannical.
Two points:
1) I am also in favor of retroceding DC (minus the "Federal core") to Maryland.
2) You will be extremely careful in your references to Swarthmore, otherwise I will oscillate from unresponsive to tyrannical myself.
Even assuming, arguendo, that the 2nd amendment guarantees individuals not in state militias the right to bear arms, that does not mean that time place and manner restrictions cannot be justified.
I voted against Moran in the primary, and actually gave Mary Lynne Cheney a chance at my vote in the general election. She failed, but that's another story. Given some of the gems that conservative districts have produced, I would tread softly if I were JJV in making fun of the whack jobs that have popped up in democratic enclaves.
There really is no excuse for the District not being represented in both houses of Congress, one way or another. "Taxation without Representation is Tyranny" as they used to say. It's really beyond cynicism for anyone who trumpets spreading democracy abroad to trip this up because of a suspicion that they won't like who the citizens elect.
John C.
There is a provision of the Constitution explicitly created to forbid a State from splitting off into two or more states and thus getting more Senators. John C's proposal would violate that provision. Interestingly, Texas got approval upon entry to the Union to break up into three to five states should it wish. I do not know whether it now can but Maryland can't. Also, I advocate D.C. paying no federal tax. No one however has to live in the District and indeed it exists at all only because of the Constitution. To request being the seat of federal power with all the benefits that entails and also get the representation that states get seems a bit much.
I am sure those gentlemen you use to step over on the way home from the Tune In were enjoying all of the benefits that living in the seat of federal power entail.
I was going to ask for an enumeration of the benefits myself but Bryan woke up and it was back to parenting.
I actually did not see much of a proposal in John C's comment, just the correct assertion that DC's residents should be represented (directly) in some fashion. We go to war with the comments we have, not the ones we would like to have.
JJV's note on Texas gives me an idea. What if we retroceded DC to Texas, then allowed it to split off into its own state per the original annexation agreement? It wouldn't make the bureacracy any more of a fustercluck than it already is.
Thanks Dave - I was going to politely ask what the hell my proposal was, exactly, so I'd be able to tell whether I was for it or against it.
I'm going to infer that JJV was unconsciously propping up a straw man (rather than doing so consciously) to whack at. It's become a reflex among ideologues of virtually all stripes (except mine of course - but I can't see my stripes without a mirror, so even then I only see them in reverse) that they address the issue they were trained to answer/want to answer rather than the issue that was raised. It makes political news conferences even more difficult to watch, really.
John C.
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