U.S.A. – -(Ammoland.com)- “GOP Congressman Says the Republican Party is in ‘Troubled Waters’ Thanks to the Marjorie Taylor Greene ‘Element’,” Mediaite reports. Michigan Rep. Fred Upton was discussing “the rising prevalence of firebrands” with host Chuck Todd on NBC’s Meet the Press.
The object here is for “The Swamp” to reclaim lost ground, to marginalize (and ultimately “cancel”) those challenging the political status quo, and to ensure the GOP is essentially Democrat-Lite. Or as a young Bill Clinton influencer, Georgetown University professor Carroll Quigley advocated:
“The argument that the two parties should represent opposed ideals and policies, one, perhaps, of the Right and the other of the Left, is a foolish idea acceptable only to doctrinaire and academic thinkers. Instead, the two parties should be almost identical, so that the American people can ‘throw the rascals out’ at any election without leading to any profound or extensive shifts in policy.”
By inviting Republicans like Upton on to the show, NBC News can pretend its coverage is unbiased. That feeds the created perception that those to the right of (acceptable) “moderates” are “extremists.” Come time for manipulating the electorate, the moderates are then presented as “uncompromising,” and “right-wing.” And the goalposts move again.
Greene has certainly initiated her share of controversy, and the object here is not to enter that debate. If you’re a Second Amendment advocate, and since it’s not about guns but freedom, the one issue that should take precedence over all others is the right to keep and bear arms. On that score, she has proven herself not only willing to defend it legislatively, but to proactively lead in both advancing it and in regaining lost ground:
So naturally, Democrat apparatchiks are trying to disenfranchise citizens from voting for her reelection. And naturally, “the usual suspects” within the GOP were happy to help their “friends across the aisle” by voting to strip Greene of her committee assignments, including (Surprise!) Fred Upton.
So, what’s Fred done for them to make gun owners favor empowering his “element” over hers? How, exactly, has he paid them back for that NRA “A” rating (reduced to “50%” in 2020, with GOA giving him a pathetic “15%”)? How has he honored his pledge that, in exchange for their votes, he’d be “Defending your Second Amendment rights”?
- He joined ultimate turncoat Debbie Dingell to introduce federal “red flag” confiscations.
- He supported “bipartisan” (Democrat-led and Republican useful idiot-followed) registration-enabling private sales prohibitions.
- He opposed emergency border security funding (and yes, that is definitely “single issue-related” no matter what some “gun rights influencers” would like you to believe for reasons of their own).
- CNN gives him publicity to decry “conservative hardliner tactics” as a “pain in the a**.”
- There’s plenty more.
Fortunately for Michigan gun owners, Upton will not be seeking reelection. But after 35 years in office and a career of serial betrayals, the question ought to be “Why did most put up with it?”
That and “With Republicans like these, who needs Democrats?”
Plenty of Upton-like “elements” still exists within the GOP. How does your Republican candidate stack up? How do primary challengers, assuming there are any?
About David Codrea:
David Codrea is the winner of multiple journalist awards for investigating/defending the RKBA and a long-time gun owner rights advocate who defiantly challenges the folly of citizen disarmament. He blogs at “The War on Guns: Notes from the Resistance,” is a regularly featured contributor to Firearms News, and posts on Twitter: @dcodrea and Facebook.
Greene and Boebert are true American Patriots. As is Winsome Sears.
We need to encourage more of them to step into the spotlight.
Think what a 2024 ticket could be with any of those 3 as Trumps VP candidate.
The NRA Freedom magazine has a written interview with Winsome Sears.
Yes, I know the NRA is toxic here on Ammoland.
Wish it was Joe Miller
MTG has more balls than most of the men in the GOP.
Let us not forget that Upton was behind changing light bulbs. Probably cares about the environment as much as he does gun rights. His law made big changes in producing light bulbs. American production nearly wiped out and store shelves filled with chinese substitutes. There can be no hell hot enough for this kind of bastard.
“Instead, the two parties should be almost identical, so that the American people can ‘throw the rascals out’ at any election without leading to any profound or extensive shifts in policy.”
So we can switch our support from “Eastasia” to “Eurasia” or back with only a few moments of disorientation.
George Orwell would b proud.
https://orwellsociety.com/timeline-airstrip-one/
Upton is following in the footsteps of Mitch McConnell, Lisa Murkowski, Susan Collins, Lindsey Graham and Mitt Romney, all RINOs, some more than others!!
Virginians look on in envy, For there are no longer any Republicans there. Many races still have anti-Coonstitution Democrats running unopposed.
“Your growing extremism is alienating more and more of the non-gun owning public” In fact the growing extremism of the left has caused more and more of the non-gun owning to become first time gun owners ! When the democrats hold a presidential debate and candidate “Beto ” affirms ” Hell Yes ! we’re coming to take your AR-15s and AK-47s” and none of the other many candidates disagree, I think you can expect some push back from people that see their rights under attack. I feel sure that many posters here think as I do, that Que Bono ?’s… Read more »
the number of women that carry guns is way up, they have discovered they dont have to let someone bigger rape them, and they want their daughters to be able to protect themselves too; being a victim is not great proactive self defense is empowering. . sam colt made them equal too
Green would just be a bad joke, if she wasn’t so dangerous to our democracy. You can’t call your self a true patriot, or claim to be a conservative and still support Green or what she represents. Too many of my fellow gun rights activists have tunnel vision, ignoring the most egregious, disingenuous behavior from any demagogue who also professes to support gun rights. No American should be willing to sacrifice the rest of the Constitution on the alter of the 2nd Amendment, but that is what many of us are actually doing in practice. Your growing extremism is alienating… Read more »
Do believe a school voucher system should be used to provide an alternative to public schools and end the virtual monopoly enjoyed by public school teachers and administrators?
Crickets Chirping, Comrade Qui!
Chirp…Chirp…Chirp…
The biggest danger to “our democracy” is that we don’t have one. Democracy works in small groups, but as the Athenians found out, and our Founders observed, in larger groups it becomes mob rule. Our Founders both feared and hated democracy. So they set our government up as a republic with some of its components operating in a limited democratic fashion. This is not semantics. The two systems are very different in function and results. The biggest danger to our Republic, is that one of our major political parties is hell bent on turning it into a democracy, and way… Read more »
Whenever people use “our democracy” in an argument, it is a cautionary flag. Qui Bono? is a retired school teacher who supports the concepts of a massive government with a lot of power. As you point out, a simple “democracy” results in mob rule. The majority of the people want a massive government to redistribute the wealth (in many, many ways) of the minority to the majority. Our constitutional republic has been bastardized through the taxation system and the various other systems designed to constantly grow the power of the government. In previous conversations Qui Bono? avoided answering questions about… Read more »
Your false assumptions and spurious allegations about me aside, you know that the Founders built in checks and balances to ward against mob rule, yet you fall for the populist rhetoric of demagogues like Trump, DeSantis, Green, et al. Mob rule is exactly what we saw on Jan. 6. We are a Constitutional Republic governed by democratically chosen representatives, yet the RINOs who call themselves Republicans are no true conservatives – they value neither civility, nor the rule of law – but reactionaries who wrap themselves in the flag and pretend to worry about our liberties even as they push… Read more »
That’s a big paragraph for a school teacher. Please explain how you define a “small government conservative.” The checks and balances are largely gone. Once the federal government obtained the power to tax it was the beginning of the end. Then they promised retirement funds. Then they promised “free” medical care for certain groups of people. The promises escalated from there – all funded by debt and redistribution of wealth. I’m not guided by fear of change and insecurity. I’m guided by the concepts of freedom and equal treatment under the law. I don’t fall for the rhetoric of anyone.… Read more »
So, you think you’d be happier living under the Articles of Confederation rather than the Constitution. That pretty much tells me all I need to know about you. You are no patriot. Nor do you see the inherent contradictions in your own arguments. How can you have vouchers without taxes? How can you have “equal treatment under the law” across 50 states without a central government empowered to provide it? And if you know anything about Social Security, you know it was designed as a pay-as-you-go system to protect against abject poverty, not to provide a cushy retirement. Due to… Read more »
Re: the Constitution – you really are reaching on that point since I support the Constitution. We have property taxes – that’s not going to end. Why do you insist the education portion be directed toward only the education system run by the government? They have an entire bureaucracy established to protect themselves from both their customers and the other people who fund them and don’t use their services. Social Security and Medicare were always about redistribution of wealth. As an example, a person works in the private sector his entire life as an at-will employee. Each year a certain… Read more »
Not a reach at all. You said “Once the federal government obtained the power to tax it was the beginning of the end.” That power was obtained when the Constitution was ratified. The Constitution also says that education is the purview of the states. The only way the federal government can influence education in the states is by offering money to states for educational purposes, and then attaching strings to it. I am adamantly opposed to this. However, this is not really on the feds; no state is required to accept those federal funds. If anyone needs to be held… Read more »
Let me be more specific – the power to tax income (on a regular basis), with no restraint. I agree with your comments on Republican and Democrat politicians refusing to turn down federal funds. If the standards are set by the practitioners (versus politicians and billionaires), and the parents had a choice of whether to send their kids to government schools teaching communism, satanism, racism, and gender fluidity versus a private school that is teaching reading, writing, arithmetic, history, science, etc., why would you object? Many parents (and others who are paying taxes that go to schools) object to the… Read more »
A teacher should know that the Constitution doesn’t approve ALL taxes, but only ones that are “uniform”, NOT ones that vary from moment to moment.
To wit: “all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States”- US Constitution, section 8, paragraph 1.
Never said “that the Constitution… approve(s) ALL taxes,” did I?
a one room school house system provided a better education than children are getting today
Well said.
“Too many of my fellow gun rights activists have tunnel vision, ignoring the most disingenuous behavior from any demagogue who professes to support gun rights. No American should be willing to sacrifice the rest of the Constitution on the alter of 2A.”
I doubt he’s a “gun rights activist”. Clearly doesn’t care about “our democracy” or Constitution. Projects crocodile tears like a slippery Bloomberg troll.
IMO, Qui Bono is an expert at his username. He knows that his job and/or pension relies upon unlawful taxation, and so who benefits from his distortions of the facts? Qui Bono does, that’s who! 🙂
Qui Bono? Qui Bono Bonos! 😉
Raise a fuss – damned straight! Ever notice how quickly you and your friends stoop to insults, false assumptions and character assassination whenever anyone challenges your more outrageous assertions or factual errors, or even strays slightly from your absolutist orthodoxy? Your don’t respect freedom of speech, you demand full conformity! Intolerance of dissent is a sign of fear and insecurity.
I believe you have the right to express your views.
Your first post had some sporty language in it and you got a little back. Some of what you got back was based on things you have indicated in prior discussions – they weren’t assumptions, they were interpretations of what you have previously written.
You indicated you are a traditional small government conservative. Do you believe the Department of Education should be eliminated?
What further regulation of firearms do you support at the federal level?
What do you believe the top marginal federal income tax rate should be?
To answer your questions: I do think the Department of Ed. should be eliminated. I do not support further Federal gun control legislation, except that I prefer national reciprocity over so-called Constitutional Carry. The income tax was first often called “the millionaire’s tax.” I don’t have an opinion about what specific rate the super rich should pay, but I don’t think someone like Warren Buffet should pay less than his secretary. The reason you are all confounded by me is because I am not an extremist, I am a center-right conservative. I’ve never been a Democrat, but am no longer… Read more »
More evasion, Comrade. Waiting for the evidence that you weren’t bullsh!tting.
Chirp…Chirp…Chirp…
I’m not confounded by you, I’m trying to understand your views on policy. The Buffet argument (the incorrect statement that he pays less taxes than his secretary or the misleading statement that he pays a lower rate than his secretary) is often used by people who support the core of socialist ideology: “From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs.” Buffet is so far out on the extreme right tail of the distribution curve, but his situation is frequently used as justification for raising taxes on people who make a tiny fraction of what he makes… Read more »
Some of the people who “doth protest too much” about “socialists” support the very core of socialist ideology.
It’s funny, but it does distract from discussions of policy when they refuse to acknowledge facts and substitute their “feelings” (I’m not referring to you Qui Bono?).
Thank you for making my point for me. You are totally immersed in far right B.S. “we support owning guns and the people that support the 2nd amendment to the fullest degree whole heartedly,” even when they lie, cheat, steal, and trample on our other liberties, like “peaceful protest?” “they have not been teaching true American history for many years now” How would you know? You sound like the kid who slept through history and civics class. If you had been awake, you would know that all rights come with responsibilities; that no rights are unlimited – every right ends… Read more »
“Anyone who looks in dictionaries of 1789 can find what the framers would’ve found.”
Prove it! Current Oxford:
Infringe
1) Actively break the terms of a law, agreement etc
2) Act so as to limit, undermine, or encroach
‘widespread surveillance could infringe personal liberties’
Abridge
1) Shorten
2) Curtail a right or privilege
example: ‘even the right to free speech can be abridged’
Show us those ancient dictionary defs. Bet it was tough for you to resist parroting the discredited collective rights 2A “interpretation”. LOL!
I don’t believe in the collective rights interpretation. The Bill of Rights protects individual rights, but all of those rights are subject to limits. Yours is the more extreme interpretation, unfounded in historical fact, that your rights are not subject to any limits or regulation other than self-regulation. “If men were angels, there would be no need of government.” You don’t trust any government – I don’t trust you or your self-centered judgement, especially to protect or respect my rights.
Let’s see all them ancient definitions the framers would’ve seen, Comrade! LOL
Crickets Chirping
Chirp…Chirp…Chirp…
Your lack of intellectual effort is truly stunning.
Your evasion-deflection is truly relentless, Comrade! But here’s a consolation prize. One of your heroes!
“infringe” means to “break” or violate; “abridge” means to limit. “The right of the people to bear arms shall not be infringed” – it can not be broken or forbidden. It does not say that it cannot be abridged, or limited through rules or regulation.
It also means “to encroach” today.
Do you have a dictionary from the late 1700s?
LOL. Qui B was caught bullSH!Tting on that. If he had it he would’ve proved it.
I’d be interested in seeing a dictionary from that time period. I went back and looked at dictionaries published in the 1960s and 1970s and only the military (not law enforcement) is excluded from the definition of “civilian.” That’s one of the reasons I typically put “civilian” in quotes. I wonder who lobbied to get the definition of “civilian” changed? I don’t mean to derail this thread, but it’s interesting. I’d rather try to keep this discussion based on policy. As a “traditional small government conservative:” Does he believe that Bill of Rights was to protect the rights of all… Read more »
there are real nice period dictionaries in the library at Norwich University , and I bet in many old libraries they are still on the shelves, a good modern unabridged dictionary like random house gives archaic meanings as well as current and time frames of the meaning. I have one from 1810 and my modern random house from 1960s
It would be interesting to have a look at them. Here are the “civilian” definitions I was referencing (the examples were actually 50s and 60s): Funk & Wagnalls New College Standard Dictionary (1950): 1. One who follows the pursuits of civil life, as distinguished from the military, naval, or clerical 2. One learned in the Roman or civil law. Webster’s New World Dictionary of the American Language College Edition (1962): 1. Any person not in the military or naval service. 2. A specialist in civil or Roman law Webster’s New World Dictionary of the American Language College Edition (1964): 1. Any person… Read more »
Did you read the entire article I referenced?
I did, that’s why I asked if you have a dictionary (source document) from that time period. I’d like to look more into the article you referenced, rather than taking Margie’s word for it and her interpretation of the Hamilton quote.
I did. Probably real popular at the annual Hairsplitters Convention. As you pointed out – an abridgement is not an infringement, BUT an abridgement pushed too far IS an infringement. You did not mention the second half. I believe these people you hastily label extremists have witnessed enough abridgements over the decades that they think their rights are infringed beyond all doubt .
“If men were angels there’d be no need of gvt”
More like if gvt were angels there’d be no need of 2A.
Nearly all 20th Century vics were murdered by enforcers of gvts that professed your belief in limits to RKBA.
“I just follow orders! If that’s wrong, the Supreme Court would say so.”
Spend a little more time THINKING and a little less time RANTING. I’m pretty sure none of the Founders consulted the current Oxford English Dictionary. You can try to twist history to suit your own agenda, but it won’t hold up under scrutiny by honest individuals.
Nice try, Comrade. You said your definition was still current. I proved it isn’t. And your inability to show the alleged ancient definitions proves you were talking out of your rear.
If you’re a strict constructionist, you disregard “current definitions” and adhere to original language and intent.
Nice try. Let’s review the bidding:
“the word infringe meant to break, to violate. It still does.“ -QuiB
You made claims you can’t prove. I busted you for it.
Contrary to your misreps, infringe never meant only what you claimed, and it doesn’t now.
The crickets are waiting for those ancient definitions, Comrade.
Chirp…Chirp…Chirp…
WB’s Crybaby OATHBREAKER posse trolling with downvotes again. LOL, Over The Target
That diatribe is so messed up I do not even know where to start.
Start by taking your blinders off, and engage in conversations outside the echo chamber of far-right media and message boards.
Whassup, Qui?
could be east coast, mass new york conn,nj ri , you guys forget the east coast is pretty messed up with demoncrats
I have not learned anything about Constitutional interpretation on this site.
At least the Wonder Twins now have some as equally mentally unbalanced as they, yet opposite, with which to argue. It’s like watching a room full of schizophrenics argue about what’s for lunch even though the menu is clearly posted.
Ya know … it was kind of entertaining. Sadly, I think that they have driven QB away like the others.
The biggest danger is one’s like you, that fail to recognize that we are not a Democracy, , but a Constitutional Republic! Remember the Pledge of Allegiance that you said back in grade skool? “And to the REPUBLIC for which it stands?”
Is it coming back to you yet, or are you still fooled by FDR’s removal of the word; “Republic”, and its replacement by the word: “Democracy”, back in 1933?
Did you mean to post that to Qui Bono? I believe DDS was making the same point you are making.
Yes, it works for either/or. Anybody that says: “our Democracy” like it was ever lawful. Only conjured up by the FDR faction under cover of the Great Depression, but skillfully enough that hardly anybody noticed back then. So the lie continues. It still holds people like a trap, since it’s the only word they are allowed to hear. Except for in the “Pledge of Allegiance” which is why the efforts to abolish it. I had to study for years, and then read the entire “Federalist Papers”, to reason out the difference. It’s not an easy trap to find one’s way… Read more »
Didn’t say we were a pure democracy, or that we should be. Said “We are a Constitutional Republic governed by democratically chosen representatives….” Anger clouds your vision as badly as it does your judgement, apparently.
you do that was added during the McCarthy period right?
it was not originally in the pledge so as not to disenfranchise druids and other groups (native americans)
Gvt-union ‘teacher’-groomers protect our democracy with coups like The Big Steal in ’20. Nice projection re Last of the Mohicans, Comrade
Yes. The same people who wouldn’t go to work while the heroic grocery store clerks did their part to keep Americans from starving.
You’ve been “groomed” and brain-washed by unprincipled authoritarian extremists. You are the “sheep”, being led by wolves to your own – and our nation’s – destruction.
Woke parrots are “extremely dangerous to our democracy”!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D9rbHpA_6W4
LOL!
You cite YouTube?!? Don’t make me laugh! You can find propaganda to support any viewpoint on the internet, including the Communist Manifesto and Mein Kampf.
You funny guy, Comrade!
https://rumble.com/vz5rx1-this-is-extremely-dangerous-to-our-democracy-treasonous-msm-exposed..html
You are irredeemable. P.S. it’s Kool Aid, and you are clearly still sucking it from Trump’s teat.
We don’t even want to know what you’re sucking on, Comrade.
Yeah, much like Harold Hutchison, Qui Bono ? has stimulated a lot of conversation .