Nothing Exemplifies the Political Divide More Than The Issue Of Firearms

Opinion

New York – -(AmmoLand.com)- The Radical New Progressive Left abhors guns as much from an aesthetic standpoint as from a political, social, and ethical one.

Thus, they never fail to use a particularly tragic albeit rare instance of misuse of a firearm by the criminal and the occasional lunatic to denounce firearms ownership and possession generally, vociferously, and this is reflected in the question they ask and the manner in which they ask it: How can society protect itself from the “scourge” of guns?

You will note that their professed concern is that of society, of the Collective, the Hive, not that of the individual, even if they perforce assert that their concern is to protect lives. Be advised, the question they pose is really rhetorical as their answer to the scourge of guns is implied in the question as framed, namely: remove as many guns, and as many kinds of guns, and from as many people, as possible, and in the shortest amount of time. But, will doing so, really serve to protect people? Radical New Progressive Leftists don’t respond rationally to this query, because they accept their premise as a given, even if statistically untrue; and the assumption is untrue that more innocent lives will be spared once guns are removed from the citizenry.

Although the idea is false, one may reasonably ask if the premise is even plausible since millions of average law-abiding, rational Americans do use semiautomatic firearms for self-defense. Statistically, in any given year, hundreds of thousands of people and, according to some studies, over one million people, use firearms successfully for self-defense.

See, e.g., See, Guns, Crime, And Safety: A Conference Sponsored by the American Enterprise Institute and the Center for Law, Economics, and Public Policy at Yale Law School: Safe-Storage Gun Laws: Accidental Deaths, Suicides, and Crime, 44 J. Law & Econ. 659, 660-664 (1991) by John R. Lott, Jr., American Enterprise Institute and John E. Whitley, University of Adelaide.

Who will protect the lives of the people when they they are denied the best means available for defending their life and the lives of family members?

On the issue of gun violence, the Conservative, asks a different question entirely. It is this: “How can the citizenry best protect itself from violent acts, generally?”

Framed in this way, the real issue, for the political and social Conservative, has less to do with guns and more to do with a desire to curb those elements in society that are the cause of violence, whether those elements cause violence by means of guns, knives, bombs, or any other implement, including the use of bare hands.

Framing the question in the way that the Conservative does, three things become clear.

• First, it is manifestly clear that, for the political and social Conservative, no less than for the framers of our Constitution, and consistent with the framers political and social philosophy, grounded on the tenets of Individualism, and not Collectivism, the critical concern is directed to maximizing the life, and safety, and well-being of the individual from both the violence of others and from the tyranny of Government.
• It is manifestly clear, second, that ultimate concern ought to be, and must be, for the life, health, safety, and well-being of the individual in society. For the Conservative, there is nothing beneficial to be perceived in maintaining order in society merely for the sake of the greater society, the Collective, the Hive. Rather, the central focus must be on ensuring the life, health, safety, and well-being of actual people, namely, for the hundreds of millions of innocent individual souls that comprise society.
• Third, it is manifestly clear that the best means of securing the life, safety, and well-being of the individual in society, and that which also serves at the same time to prevent the onset of Governmental usurpation of the sovereignty of the American people—i.e., to prevent tyranny or, at least, to deter the onset tyranny—is by arming the citizen. This the Founders knew full well, and they provided for it in codifying the right of the people to keep and bear arms in the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Thus, the immediate answer to threats of violence from criminals, and from the threat of lunatics hell-bent on creating violence, preying at will on the innocent members of the polity, is by seeing to it that every law-abiding, rational citizen who wishes to exercise his or her right to keep and bear arms for the purpose of self-defense and to deter the tyranny of Government is not prevented from doing so. It is self-evident, true both in the dim past and to the present day, that the individual will have the best chance of successfully thwarting the threat of aggression and violence if he has the best means of at hand of doing so. That means arming the citizen with a firearm. Further, the armed citizenry is the most effective means of thwarting the rise of totalitarianism in the Nation.

For Leftists though, the very idea of arming the citizen is anathema. They willingly accept, and many of them gladly accept, the loss of innocent lives as long as the greater society, the Collective, the Hive, is secured. Societal order, as they see it, can only come about through the presence of a powerful Government overseeing the Left’s vision of a well-ordered, well-engineered society. The armed citizen is, as they see it, a dire threat to the preservation of that, as well as to the very existence of a well-ordered, well-engineered society. This means that any potential threat to the authority of Government must be checked. An armed citizenry is perceived as an ominous, direct threat to the authority of Government, just as our Founding Fathers intended. Of course, Leftists know full well that, for what they have in mind, criminal misuse of firearms will continue unabated, regardless of the insincere messaging they spew to the public, directly or through their fellow traveler, the Press.

It is no mistake then, that the vast majority of firearms laws—federal, State, and local—that presently exist, and the many more the Radical Progressive New Left wants to enact, are directed to restricting the average, law-abiding citizens’ exercise of their fundamental, immutable, unalienable right to keep and bear arms—more than simply preventing the criminal and lunatic. For if they truly wished to prevent or reduce criminal use of firearms, they would argue for fervent enforcement of the laws that presently exist, and would ensure that any new law they sought to create would zero in on the criminal and lunatic, not target millions of average, law-abiding, sane gun owners. If questioned about this, they would be compelled to admit it is so. Their justification is that criminals and lunatics will be brought under the umbrella of further restrictive gun laws, and that any law-abiding American who wishes to exercise his or her right to keep and bear arms should understand that forced gun restrictions on law-abiding guns owners is the best way to protect everyone. This is no more than a makeweight and arrogant presumption, and it is an erroneous presumption at that.

One can, of course, debate the issue of whether the loss of individual safety and well-being is an acceptable price to pay for presumed public safety and well-being. The Conservative would be willing to engage in debate the issue in front of the Nation. The Radical New Progressive Leftist would never be willing to do so, finding it easier to shout down naysayers, rather than engaging in calm, rational, intelligent debate. Be that as it may, what is lost in any argument about safety and security is the nature of the right at stake.

The Collectivist vision of America constitutes, in fact requires: one, the death of a free Constitutional Republic; two, the end to the sovereignty of the American People; and, three, the end to the autonomy, sanctity, and inviolability of the individual American citizen.

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Side Bar:

*A reader has questioned terminology the Arbalest Quarrel has been using to describe adherents of left-wing political and social philosophies. We have been regularly employing the terminology “Radical Leftist ” and the softer, “Progressive,” routinely in our discourse since Democratic Party policy and policy objectives and agendas of Leftist social and political advocacy groups are now dominated by Left-wing extremism. The expression, “New Progressive Left,” has been suggested as more apropos, today, as applied to both Left-wing Radicals and Left-wing Progressives. As an aside, we note that the expression, ‘Populist,’ has been used by many to refer to supporters of President Trump. Left-wing newspapers, such as The New York Times, often use the term, ‘Nationalist,’ when referring to those on the proverbial “right” of the political spectrum. The term, ‘Nationalist,’ has, of late, become, improperly, associated with, and a synonym for, Fascism and Nazism. The term, ‘Nationalist,’ has, then, developed a pejorative connotation, which explains why the mainstream media relishes using it, eschewing the term, political ‘Conservative.’ These same newspapers disdain referring to extremists on the Left as “Radical” or even as “Progressive,” preferring the benign, and inaccurate, expression ‘liberal,’ as a signifier or identifier of all those who espouse “Left-wing” political and social philosophies even though the term, ‘liberal,’ as a politically “soft” expression is decidedly inaccurate as applied to many Democrats. It is certainly inaccurate as applied to Democrat House members of the so-called “squad.” Indeed, we would prefer to use the term ‘brood,’ rather than ‘squad,’ to describe Ocasio-Cortez, Tlaib, Omar, and Pressley. And, we have in mind, for doing so, the 1979 horror movie by the same name. The movie, starring Oliver Reed and Samantha Eggar, was directed by David Cronenberg. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Brood.

The expression ‘liberal’ as applied to many on the political Left is certainly a misnomer, as many so-called “liberals” are decidedly and decisively illiberal. They are clearly extremists on the far left, falling into the radical category of the political spectrum that include Marxists, Socialists, and, the most extreme of Left-wing ideologues, Communists. As left-wing extremism has become ever more “mainstream,” the term, ‘liberal,’ is far less an accurate descriptor of those who espouse Left-wing political and social policies. True liberals, as with political moderates, are becoming an endangered species. In fact, one truly political liberal, Professor Alan Dershowitz, who rightfully refers to himself as a “Civil Libertarian,” has become persona non-grata, even a pariah among the “Left”, for espousing political views that do not properly reflect the extremist posture that has infected Left-wing politics today. This does not portend anything good for our Nation. At least Americans know now that, with their mask off, the Billionaire neo-liberal, trans-nationalists, who are orchestrating the demise of our Country, are doing so overtly, glaringly. They had no choice, really, as they are frustrated with the election of Donald Trump to the U.S. Presidency. President Trump has attempted, as promised in his Campaign, to return our Country to its historical roots. The Globalist Elite want none of that. To get the Nation back on the course they had set for it, in line with their design for a new world order, it is necessary to attack Trump, and by extension, to attack all those who support him; they are doing so, aggressively, ceaselessly, viciously.

There is nothing discreet about it. But, now Americans know full well what these ruthless elements are up to.

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