The War On Guns: A Flank Attack

From a conventional, gun-control-friendly news story such as this one:

Supporters of a U.N. treaty designed to regulate the multibillion-dollar global arms trade were optimistic that a final draft circulated a day before Thursday's deadline will reach consensus.

Negotiators reconvened last week in a final attempt to reach a deal on the Arms Trade Treaty, which would require all countries to establish national regulations to control the transfer of conventional arms and to regulate arms brokers....

The draft treaty does not control the domestic use of weapons in any country, but it would require all countries to establish national regulations to control the transfer of conventional arms, parts and components and to regulate arms brokers. It would prohibit states that ratify the treaty from transferring conventional weapons if they would violate arms embargoes or if they would promote acts of genocide, crimes against humanity or war crimes.

The final draft makes this human rights provision even stronger, adding that the export of conventional arms should be prohibited if they could be used in the commission of attacks on civilians or civilian buildings such as schools and hospitals.

...you'd most likely come away thinking that this treaty proposal is innocuous, even benign. After all, who's in favor of "acts of genocide, crimes against humanity or war crimes," or "attacks on civilians or civilian buildings such as schools and hospitals," anyway?

But the NRA is strongly against the treaty, and there are some mighty good reasons:

On Monday, March 25, the permanent mission to the United Nations from Mexico sponsored a press event where representatives of four major non-governmental organizations (NGOs) made statements on the progress of the Arms Trade Treaty (ATT) negotiations currently underway in New York....

“This treaty is not good enough,” said Anna MacDonald of Oxfam. “This is not the treaty that is going to save lives and protect people.”

Decrying the “loopholes,” “weaknesses,” and “deficiencies” of the proposal, the groups called for increased regulation and more robust enforcement provisions....

Among the many complaints registered by these human rights groups, the one most often mentioned Monday was the draft proposal’s failure to clamp down on the sale, trade, and transfer of ammunition....

When pressed by reporters to name the state parties responsible for the treaty’s lack of substantial anti-ammo provisions, MacDonald named the United States....

There is also the irrefutable fact that there would be no conference right now were it not for the fact that the Obama administration’s previously filed objections to the treaty mysteriously disappeared after the president won reelection in November.

Within hours, in fact, of locking up another four years in the White House, President Obama ordered the U.S. diplomats to vote in favor of another round of negotiations and to green light the globalist gun grab.

That sort of coverage makes you whip out a magnifying glass and scamper back to the first article...and looky here!

... if they would promote...
...if they could be used...

What criteria would be used to decide such things? Who would write them -- and who would interpret them?

(Apropos of that second article, The New American is the magazine of the John Birch Society, and a very fine publication it is. No matter whether or not you completely accept the Birchers' conspiratorialist premises, their coverage of freedom-related issues and political developments is about the best around.)

One of the worst mistakes a polity can make is to allow public officials any discretion at all. The law is supposed to be plain of meaning, stable and reliable, and consistent in its effects on everyone under its jurisdiction. If it isn't, you don't have "rule of law;" you have "rule of whim:" the whim of whoever's in office at the time.

Americans are jealous of their right to keep and bear arms, and rightly so: an armed populace is the ultimate control on the actions of government. Public officials dislike the thought of being controlled. In their opinion, it's their prerogative to do all the controlling. So they like "reasonable and proper" clauses, and laws filled with "coulds" and "woulds." The discretion those weasel words provide allows them latitude...latitude they can put to use in strapping us down ever more straitly.

The final form of the ATT Treaty is guaranteed to contain all sorts of variably interpretable language: the sort that allows public officials to rationalize any and every sort of intrusion on private firearms manufacture, sale, ownership, and use. If it's ratified by the Senate, the right to keep and bear arms will be chipped away to nullity. You can bank on it.

Cyprus Part Three: The Infection Spreads

I was pleased to read yesterday that the Cypriot Parliament rejected the savings-confiscation measure the EU central bank had proposed as a condition of a bailout loan for Cypriot banks. I was considerably less pleased to read this:

The National Government are pushing a Cyprus-style solution to bank failure in New Zealand which will see small depositors lose some of their savings to fund big bank bailouts, the Green Party said today.

Open Bank Resolution (OBR) is Finance Minister Bill English’s favoured option dealing with a major bank failure. If a bank fails under OBR, all depositors will have their savings reduced overnight to fund the bank’s bail out.

"Bill English is proposing a Cyprus-style solution for managing bank failure here in New Zealand – a solution that will see small depositors lose some of their savings to fund big bank bailouts," said Green Party Co-leader Dr Russel Norman.

"The Reserve Bank is in the final stages of implementing a system of managing bank failure called Open Bank Resolution. The scheme will put all bank depositors on the hook for bailing out their bank.

"Depositors will overnight have their savings shaved by the amount needed to keep the bank afloat."

An Anglospheric country -- a country steeped in Anglo-American conceptions of individual rights, most notably the sanctity of property -- is actually entertaining the EU's noxious scheme. Moreover, the proposal has strong support from inside the sitting government of New Zealand.

If memory serves, the subjects of that government are not conceded the right to keep and bear arms. That might be all that's keeping Finance Minister Bill English's skin intact.

I hate to say "I told you so," even when I did. Just as much as anyone else, I wanted to believe that "it can't happen here." But if it can happen in New Zealand, why can't it happen in America, especially as several variations on the idea have already been discussed on the floor of the Senate, in open session?

Now more than ever, it's vital to the survival of any degree of freedom whatsoever that Americans retain their firearms. The one and only control we have over the actions of our political class is the threat of an armed revolt. It's high time we let the politicos know that we've had enough and will tolerate no more...and that the price for any further incursions upon our rights will be exacted from their hides.

Knowledge Is Power

The above aphorism, which Queen Cersei seemingly refuted by demonstration in season 2 of the HBO production of A Game of Thrones, nevertheless contains a large kernel of truth. In any contest between opposing forces, all other things being equal, the one with better knowledge -- of the terrain; of the enemy's motives; of the enemy's forces and disposition -- will prevail nearly all the time.

Charles Hurt of The Washington Times gives us a soliloquy on that today:

Rage over the waste and injustice of agents sent by the federal government to bang on doors of law-abiding citizens to ask probing, creepy questions is normally something that bubbles up only every 10 years. But ever since the federal government became a cancerous leviathan, the outrage is now an annual occurrence....

Like all Orwellian schemes, this diabolical obsession comes with a harmless-sounding name — American Community Survey — as if it is nothing more than the local Girl Scout troop stopping by to offer you little boxes of sweet, crunchy goodness — all for a good cause!

The feds want to know exactly who you are and the color of your skin....

And they want to know your "relationships" with all the people in your house. And they want to know of any "disabilities" and — ominously — what time you leave for and return from work everyday.

These creepos even want to know how many bedrooms you have and all about your plumbing and even your "fertility."...

Forget data addiction, these people should be forced to register as sex offenders.

And, of course, they want to know exactly how much you are making, including wages, tips and even that loan you got from your grandmother. Why?

After staging a rare, genuine filibuster on the Senate floor, Sen. Rand Paul, Kentucky Republican, last week introduced Senate Bill 530 to remove the criminal penalty for those who refuse to take part in this annual federal creep-fest that is not even required by the Constitution. You can add this legislation to the growing nationwide mantra of "Stand with Rand."

He who thinks of the federal government as an essentially benevolent, beneficent entity will probably approve of all that data gathering. "It will help them to make policy," he'll say. But he who sees the federal government as the enemy -- an entity controlled by men whose raison d'etre is the acquisition of ever more power over us -- will disapprove to the brink of violence. He too would say "It will help them to make policy," but in a quite different tone of voice.

A government that knows, even institutionally, who and what you are, where you are, what your obligations are, what your resources are, and so forth has everything it needs to reduce you to a pawn, an item to be manipulated for the State's own purposes. In the fullness of time, it will do so -- no matter how ardently its masters protest their good intentions.

Skeptics of government have argued for many decades that every capability allowed in the hands of the State is eventually put to use. Think of an exception if you can; I can't.

Government snooping, greatly facilitated by the unprecedented power of modern digital technology, threatens to reduce the whole population of the United States to pawns. Should the State ever decide that it could profit by your removal from its chessboard, it will know where to find you, and what it needs to break your resistance.

Think about it.

"One Of Us"

One of John Ringo's recent novels, The Hot Gate, contains some extremely valuable musings about how people come to trust one another. (The book is the third volume in his "Troy Rising" series, which I recommend unreservedly.) I hope Mr. Ringo will allow me to summarize them without becoming litigious.

In Societies of Status, which includes most of the nations of the world, individuals tend to extend their trust to others of comparable status. (Ringo phrases that as "trust is based on relationships.") Smith's acknowledgement that Jones is "one of us" is the critical determinant in Smith's decision whether to trust Jones. This is a natural consequence of the most important social alliances in such societies: the alliances within a given social stratum, intended to promote that stratum's interests against all the others.

In a Society of Contract, such as America used to be, individuals tend to extend their trust to others of proven standards of conduct. They form friendships and other interpersonal bonds only with those who share their moral and ethical basis. (Ringo phrases that as "relationships are based on trust.") Smith will not associate with Jones, nor permit their reputations to be linked, until he is satisfied that Jones's conduct will not besmirch his own standing. When there are no class barriers, this is the most important of all criteria, as one's economic altitude and social standing are all too easily undermined by associating oneself with a lowlife.

So what are we to make of this?

On ABC’s This Week, hosted by Martha Raddatz, Speaker of the House John Boehner appeared to downplay the problem of national debt while loudly proclaiming his wonderful relationship with President Obama. “The president and I, as I have made very clear, have a very good relationship. We're open with each other. We're honest with each other,” said Boehner.

“Do you trust President Obama?” Raddatz asked.
“Absolutely,” Boehner replied.
“Absolutely?” Raddatz emphasized.
“Absolutely,” Boehner repeated.

Is Boehner speaking sincerely? Is that even possible, given Obama's record of deceit, dissimulation, and evasion of responsibility? If it is so, does it mark him as a fool? Or might it mean that Boehner sees himself and Obama as "of the same class," and therefore naturally allied against us lowly ones outside the corridors of power?

Americans speak of the "political class" with a good deal of contempt. We know it for what it is...and the politicos know it, too. It's led to an us-versus-them mindset among them, in which any tactic, however low, becomes licit if it will serve the class's interests -- and the class's principal interest, always and everywhere, is in defending and expanding its power, privileges, and perquisites.

KG at Crusader Rabbit says, quite directly, that Boehner's statement marks him as unfit for public office. I find it hard to disagree...but then, I was mostly of that opinion already, based on Boehner's beneath-lackluster performance as Speaker of the House of Representatives.