(AP Photo/Andy King)
Al Franken is going to the Senate. From The Chicago Tribune:
After a fierce legal battle and a vote recount that stretched on for seven months, the Minnesota Supreme Court unanimously ruled Tuesday that Democrat Al Franken should be certified as the winner in the state's U.S. Senate race.
Norm Coleman has conceded.
And here's the thing:
Franken's victory gives the Democratic caucus 60 votes in the Senate, enough to overcome Republican filibuster attempts.
There is a lesson here for detached/oblivious gun owners. Particularly since Franken won by a mere 312 vote margin. And especially because Coleman was rated "A" by the National Rifle Association and "B" by Gun Owners of America. You can read Coleman's voting record on gun control here.
And Franken's position on guns?
"See, I've never owned a gun," Franken wrote in a smarmy attack on those who do in Rush Limbaugh is a Big Fat Idiot.
"I won't allow one in the house."
And then there's this, from the same book:
Now again, I’ve just been talking about death from gunshot wounds. Tragic. But not as damn expensive as the pesky four to six non-fatal gunshot injuries that occur for every fatal shooting and crowd our emergency rooms. Maybe that’s why the American Academy of Pediatrics supported the Brady Bill and has called for the ban of handguns and assault weapons.
And let us not forget Franken's attendance at a Brady Campaign/Million Mom March reception to honor Teddy Kennedy's wife for her work in exploiting children to advance citizen disarmament.
312 votes. And now this bad political joke will be played out on the rest of us.
For anyone who takes their right to keep and bear arms seriously, this is no laughing matter.
Check out other Gun Rights Examiners:
- Atlanta: Armed customer stops robbery
- Austin: The world according to Brady (Part 2)
- Boston: More Federal and State Government tyranny on the way
- Charlotte: Dangers of gun registration: 'The Belgian Corporal'
- Cleveland: Favoring gun rights isn't subversion
- DC: Under Obamacare, where will Canadians go for medical services?
- Denver: H.R. 2159 is yet another grab for guns by the government
- Los Angeles: BOOK REVIEW: Lethal Logic by Dennis A. Henigan.
- Minneapolis: Taking to the air in defense of open carry
- Seattle: Careless slobs jeopardize recreational shooting for everyone
- St. Louis: Brady Campaign acknowledges proposed gun laws violate due process; doesn't care
- Wisconsin: Gun rights advocates make progress
Comments
If the non-issue of "right to bear arms" weighs heavily on you then you must live in a bubble insulated from the myriad of injustices and concerns that grown ups have to grapple with.
Waaaa!!!! The Repuketions lost and need to cry!!! No gun rights will be lost!!!! Now get over it!!!
It is too bad, isn't it, Corny? Elections have consequences. Armed terrorists and fascists don't get to decide what the rules are w/out a vote. Guess you'll have to round up your vast readership (the Three Percenters, or is it the Legion of the Archangel Michael, or the Iron Guard?) and the twelve of you go change things at the ballot box.
We're watching you, Corneliu "Dave" Codreanu, and the other eleven members of the Iron Guard. You try to play the relative 'nice guy' here, but we see the hateful, violent rhetoric on your blogs. Will be keeping in touch with the feds.
I really like FAT boy. I wish we could meet up. Really.
I see the asshats are out in droves! Its like dirty hippies and rabits. Once you get one you are soon to have all sorts running around. Dave I think it might be time to call in a professional to spray for pests.
I didn't like this guy on Saturday Nite Live.
I'm sure I won't be impressed with his attempts to fulfill the office of a US Senator.
God help us!
Be grateful for nasty little antis like FATboy, Sean--he has no argument so he resorts of need to lies and bigotry, and does so in the most cowardly of ways.
I don't mind being known by the enemies I've made. I can't think of a better testimonial for the rightness of our side.
So RKBA is a "non-issue", is it? Then you'll have no trouble BACKING OFF and leaving the peaceable alone...right?
Human beings are the only life-form dumb enough to question the idea of self-defense.
The sense of gloating here, as well, is telling. Nothing like wiping the floor with "the other guy", is there? And all the while, those who make their profession pitting groups of people against each other, sit with tented fingers and admire their work. The useful idiot may be the most productive worker bee in the history of man.
To the "hateful, violent rhetoric" comment: mark well where you have cast your lot. David's work stands on its own (always has), calling out the "myriad of injustices and concerns" perpetrated by the state--which is responsible for more butchery, oppression and betrayal of its own people than any other entity in the history of man.
They're just WAITING for you to give 'em a call and ask 'em to go dispose of the undesirables for you.
Bwak Elections have consequences!
Bwak Elections have consequences
Bwak Polly wanna cracker.
Apparantly in today's "America" fraud has no consequences. Kenyans signing laws, votes that weren't there when the initial count get added in, not reading the "laws" the frauds are passing.
These things WILL have consequences too Polly and "smart." Hopefully the country will survive them.
As to the actual topic at hand, I must ask: did anyone honestly believe that the end result would NOT end up favoring Franken?
Not that it matters that much. This is just adding another card to a deck that's already heavily stacked against free human beings.
Remember that? Free human beings? It's a concept that has become quaint as the political process inexorably moves to quash it in whatever way (disarmament, privacy, taxation, regulation) it can muster at the moment.
But...just because it has become quaint does not mean that free human beings do not and cannot exist. This may some day come as a real shock to statists who believe (with religious fervor) that because they have decreed it, it is so.
Whatever makes ya sleep better, I suppose. History rather better supports the idea that "government pretends to respect our rights, so we pretend to respect its laws", but some people conspicuously avoid history.
Hey "Smart": Wanna put your money where you mouth is? How bout placing a little side bet about "no gun rights will be lost" during the term in which the comedian represents the loony voters of Minnesota?
I bet all 12 of David's readers (as per FAT) will take some of that action.
Obviously, I'm one of the twelve.
My rights do not depend on which nasty little club happens to have the key to the treehouse. Republican, Democrat, Libertarian-in-Name-Only... they can vote and issue edicts and set punishments all they want. I don't want to control what ANYONE does, I only ask that people respect my rights -- my spelled-out, catalogued sacred rights -- as I do theirs, even their made-up ones. My owning an "assault weapon" or a handgun hasn't caused anyone any problem in my nearly 30 years of exercising my RIGHT to arms. I am NOT responsible for wounded and dead victims of "gun violence" any more than my love of a good steak makes me responsible for stabbing assaults and murders, or my appreciation of a good pair of boots means I should be blamed for the many stomping deaths that DON'T make the news.
If WE seem obsessed with our right to own guns, it is because that right was only recently called into question, except for SLAVES and CONQUERED POPULATIONS throughout history. Not happening here.
Dugg, and yes, Franken will oppose gun ownership for all but his bodyguards.
FAT's got it backwards: Armed terrorists and fascists WILL be deciding the rules. Which is the way he wants it.
Nice touch, threatening to sic the Feds on someone who is legally exercising his Constitutional right to talk about his Constitutional rights.
Is he for real, or did one of your War on Guns types invent him?
And for Jordan, which of YOUR rights are you willing to dismiss as a non-issue? Do I get to pick?
And by the way, best of luck on the "myriad of injustices" that you have to grapple with in your grown-up life. Some people have all the luck, I suppose, and then there's you.
"We the People" are ultimately responsible for what we get when all the voting or procrastinating is done.
The stark evidence of the lack of respect, honor or even interest in our political system reveals that it is of very little value to most citizens and the result is the kind of leaders recently becoming elected to office.
We have lost our moral compass, our sense of duty, honor and dignity .... even reality.
We no longer give priority to community, family and those things which make for "Life, Liberty & the Pursuit of Happiness".
We are degenerating into a selfish, and therefore, self destructive society.
I think the following quote pretty much says it all:
"The American Republic will endure until the day Congress discovers that it can bribe the public with the public's money"
-- Alexis de Tocqueville
"But have you ever imagined... what it would be like if the ENTIRE MINNESOTA ELECTORATE had six-inch nails pounded into their eyes? Davis and I think it would be something... like this..."
"Al Franken"--that bit was done by Michael O'Donoghue.
I never for one minute tho't Franken would lose when it went to a recount.
Jordon, Smart(?) and F.A.T. will be talking out of the other side of their mouths when their little ox gets gored. Of course they will never admit their error, only real men do that.
III
Hi Sean! Aw, got a crush on me, huh? Yeah, let's meet up. You are a girl, right? Girl's name and everything.
If you're just another little boy Romanian-American terrorist/fascist, you'll have to wait in line. I've got Codrea(nu) under surveillance at the moment.
David, you might want to think about a restraining order for FAT. He's publicly states that he's watching you. While he may just be trolling for male dates in this day and age one shouldn't be so careful. Being as public and "open" as you are lunatics may come seeking to provoke and attack We know the actual fascists like him aren't above lying, instigating, and playing whatever card they can to "take down" an honest man.
Not that I'm overly concerned with your well being, but a taste of the system he worships might be a nice bit of medicine to cure whatever mental ills he's exhibiting.
Tom is apparently as dense and as morally warped as Codrea(nu). The surveillance Corny is under is a direct result of him writing terrorist manifestos online, where I and every other sane person in the country can see them and report them to the proper authorities. Do you think, Tommie Boy, that you can threaten police with violence, as you fascists do all the time, then expect them to protect you from having the violent words you write online monitored? I will indeed have Corny Codrea(nu) under surveillance--that is, whenever he writes terrorist/fascist missives, I will report it to the proper authorities, as I already have. As a non-professional, of course, I only do the online surveillance--I leave the staking out and the coming to seize persons to the proper professional authorities. You know, those guys who protect our society and uphold our laws--those same guys in blue Codrea(nu) insults in the most disgusting way virtually every day on his vile blog.
Sorry about that. Heck, it was 30 years ago, and it was a particularly unfunny bit, so I just naturally remembered it as having been done by SNL's most particularly unfunny comedian.
But it's absolutely true that there was never any doubt in our minds that the runoff would go to the Democrat. They always do. They have the underworld connections, the union goons, the trial lawyers, and the whining protestors. The only way to unseat some of these perennial comeback kids -- like Teddy Kennedy and Frank Lautenberg -- is to give 'em tumors. Speaking of which, how was Lautenberg's last checkup?
David, you might want to consider doing a separate article on just what the word "fascism" means--as those throwing it around the most freely seem to have absolutely no idea.
Just a thought.
Kevin, FAT is not interested in dialog and debate. He is interested in public urination.
He's already established that he is a liar, a hypocrite, a coward and a bigot who relies on heritage-based slurs--so in a way, he's also an asset to have around, if only to provide an example of the "quality" of weasel who is against the human right of self defense.
That we can now apparently add indignant Nazi snitch to the list is not unexpected. So as for "reporting" me, no big deal. I have not said one thing on my "vile blog" that I fear being scrutinized--I say them so they will be.
David Codrea says of FAT ...
"he's also an asset to have around, if only to provide an example of the "quality" of weasel who is against the human right of self defense."
Against self defence ? I'm sure FAT said no such thing.
David, if you have to misrepresent your detractors positions to win the debate then the debate is surely lost and you are delusional. Arguing for arms control is not an argument against self-defence.
I think David was kicked around alot in the school yard. I'm glad he doesn't hold a position of power or responsibility.
You and Fatty aren't against 'self defence', you just believe in 'arms control'. Brilliant, Jordan.
Oh, you spell it with a 'c'. Must be a Brit?
And that schoolyard comment: I guess when you have no valid arguments, people like you have nothing left but your own bitterness.
Oh, sure, let's have a definition of "fascism" from the uneducated backwoods Codreanu, who has never read anything that didn't have pictures of guns in it.
Correction, Corny. I am interested in helping send criminals like you where you belong, where you are only a danger to yourself and the other inmates.
What agency did you report him to and what's the name of the LEO who took the information? Starting to look like you're getting tripped up in your lies.
He'll find an excuse not to give that information. Here's something else he won't do: Point you to even one quote of mine that could even remotely be construed as something that would warrant criminal charges--along with where it was written so it can be viewed in context.
So he can't even produce one citation but he sits there huffing and puffing about how he's going to get me locked up for exercising my First Amendment right--and he calls ME the fascist.
As I said, he's already established that he's a bigot, a liar, and a coward. Let him rant. It's all he's got.
Siiiiighhhhh!!!!!
You just have to read the childish bantering that makes up most of the comments in this blog to verify that the point in my previous comment is well taken.
The spirit of "Hatfield vs McCoy" has infested our ability to communicate.
We should at least be able to agree to disagree.....................
FAT clearly knoweth not the definition of the word "fascisti".
He has as much business here among warriors as does a pig at a bacon seller's convention.
Fascisti - an Italian political organization which siezed power and set up a fascist dictatorship (1922-43) under Mussolini.
Fascist - a person who believes in or practices fascism.
Fascism - a system of government characterized by rigid one-party dicatorship, forcible suppression of opposition, private economic enterprise under centralized governmental control, belligerent nationalism, racism, and militarism, etc.
-Webster's New World College Dictionary,
not Webster's New World Order College Dictionary.
Oooh, "under surveillance..." how very Gecko45 of you. 'Course, Gecko45 was in on the joke.
So is that you trying to hide behind the Nortal Kombat machine with the Big Gulp and the cheap binocs, over by Hot Topic?
Arguing for arms control is not an argument against self-defence(sic).--Jordan
Of course it is not. You can defend yourself against violent criminal aggression by throwing up on your attacker, or scratching his face, or shinnying up a convenient flagpole then meowing for help, or blowing loudly on a whistle, or throwing sand in his eyes and running away really fast. When the attack occurs in your home, you can hide under your bed or jump out the window.
Of course if you find all these maneuvers too much challenge to your manual dexterity or they just plain exhaust your imagination, lay down and take your chances at being raped or murdered. You could think of this as being the lazy man's approach to self defense.
For my own part, I prefer a more proactive stance. When I am out and about, I rely on my concealed handgun and Kershaw/Ken Onion "Black Out" knife; at home, my 30 round battle carbine does the job.
Which method seems more likely to discourage the bad guys, Jordan?
I moved from Minnesota, but with this joker, his ideas and votes will just follow with me to Colorado.
and I will not tell anyone I am from Minnesota after this sad day.
OOOOOH! I get it. FAT's one of O's internet goons. The "Fascist Alarm Tingling" is a warning to us. Unable to think or act for himself he reports back to the czar who reports back to the fuhrer.
No?
Maybe FAT=Jordan=Fudd?
Or FAT's daddy is an "only one?"
Maybe he can report you to one of the countless unnamed "only ones" featured in articles written by others on your blog.
Not sure how this gig works but if you're getting paid per hit he's at least good for some cash.
I thought this comment section was for grown-ups, not spoiled, adolescent bed wetters that threaten to tell "mommy and daddy" when something doesn't suit them. This is a free country Fatso. Freedom of speech is #1 on the amendments to the Constitution of the United States, (not that it really matters today). If you're going to play the stool pigeon you better start with REAL "fascists", main stream media!
As far as Al (following the flock) Franken goes, he's just another bleeding heart liberal that has, probably one of many, distorted advocacy groups hands in his pocket giving him that "little extra something" under the table. Al, dude, you are not elected to office to make policy that you or any kind of special intrest group "thinks" is a good call for others safety or well being that are proclaimed to come from viable statistics and facts. Which is never the case when it comes to liberal agenda. You are elected to office to make policy that is derived from the masses, i.e. the public.
Tingling? Isn't that what Chris Matthews' leg did when he sat close to Obama? Is F.A.T. tingling because he likes the fascist way the country is headed?
Even though Franken has now ascended to his rightful place among those enlightened who rule us mouth breathers, aren't the blue dogs enough to keep us in a safe margin until the 2010 elections? And with the rate the economy is going it's hopeful that the dems will shed some seats due to their lackluster performance on creating, er, saving jobs.
Malthus says ... "When I am out and about, I rely on my concealed handgun and Kershaw/Ken Onion "Black Out" knife; at home, my 30 round battle carbine does the job." and "Which method seems more likely to discourage the bad guys (sic), Jordan? "
What places are you frequenting Malthus that you need such an array of armaments ? Massacres require intent and capability. You have at least one half of that equation covered at all times. Your high degree of paranoia and need for absolute power over people around you makes you one of the bad guys. How do you protect yourself against guys just like you ?
Jordan and Fascist Tingler have it just right. People like David and Malthus got bullied as kids and have turned into would-be tough guys ("warriors" in the words of another child victim, who now compensates by calling himself The Commander) who don't feel right about themselves unless they can walk around in the world carrying heavy weaponry, ever fearful of the bully reappearing. The victims learn to be frightened and ruthless as a result of their victimization. Malthus probably lives in the suburbs, where the likelihood he'll run into violent criminals is next to zero, but he can't admit the reason he needs to arm himself to the gills has to do with his own psychological issues and so invents some fantasy of 'bad guys' surrounding him. The bad guys were in fact rough kids in his youth or his own father, and they gave birth to his current psychosis.
What a dismal world to live in. Imagine the mental inability to even go outside without outfitting oneself for guerrilla war.
It's too bad we don't have some federal program to examine and regulate the mental state of people you disagree with, but take comfort that it's well on the way. The path has already been paved by "hatecrime" laws. It must be reassuring to know that the social chaos and street violence we see from all over the world on TV every night could never happen here, even while our facist president and his cronies are doing all they can to engineer it. Nearly 11,000 have died in the recent round of Mexican drug wars, for instance, but that could never happen here. It's not like criminal gangs have ever come to this country. Have you been to LA or Chicago lately? Your ability to analyze people you've never met, and divine their living circumstances on such limited information is also truly amazing. It normally takes a professional analyst years to achieve your deep insights.
Meanwhile, the rest of us can read the writing on the wall, and we're stocking up on ammo. Some of us are tough.
Jordan, Charlie Lola, I too carry defensive weaponry, Not just for my own protection, but also anyone and everyone that is in my surroundings. Family, friends, total strangers. I am not the big bad G.I. Joe so many of you bleeding hearts proclaim we are. I have no ego, I refuse to be a victim. Whether it is a thug on the street, in my home or the elected officials that try to tell me I can't provide for myself. I am an American. It is not privilage to own firearms for protection. It is a duty bestowed on us by the founders of this country and Higher powers. It will be sad when the day comes that all of the weasles who sided with the criminals are victims of their own virtues.
Defender: You, along with a couple of others have referenced a "sacred" right to bear arms; In the comment thread this has also been referenced as a right bestowed by a "higher power". I have to assume that you are making the argument that weapons-bearing rights have been bestowed upon humankind by God, and while I'm not a Biblical scholar by trade, I can't help scratching my head and wondering where the textual or traditional backing is for the 'bearing weaponry as divine mandate' argument that you've alluded to here. Should I be looking for historical evidence in the history of the Holy Roman Empire? The Christian monarchies of medieval Europe? In case you were wondering, arming the proletariat is a modern phenomenon. I don't understand where you got the idea that carrying a weapon is sacrosanct, but it's a shortsighted grasp on history you have if you think your 'right'- in itself granted to you by civil society and the social contract- is a 'mandate from Heaven.'
Also, MALTHUS: I don't agree with the logic of your argument that gun ownership is the final solution to the "lazy person's" problem of not arming themselves. It's a false dichotomy you've built here-- From my vantage point, the lazy thing to do is to go out and buy a gun. Why not learn Karate or a similar form of martial art? That way, you're also more likely to learn some real discipline. I don't see how it gets more lazy than just buying a gun because you feel like it, and pulling the trigger. Where's the effort? People don't just "lay down and take it" because they're lazy. If anything, headstrong arguments like yours have influenced the national policy debate to the point where protectionist points of view have held out, and it's definitely not the victims' faults when they get attacked. More often then not, it's because someone is pointing a gun at them. Probably someone who thinks a lot like you do, along the lines of the "eat or be eaten" dichotomy.
And finally, Bu Hao: Check your facts. A huge number of the guns that make their way to Mexico for use in the drug wars were purchased and funded by cross-border arms of the same gangs, here in the United States. Plenty of them are smuggled out of the more libertarian-leaning parts of the Northeast, where gun control legislation is weak, and then they end up in Mexico. So your argument really doesn't work here, and I wouldn't be so quick to hold the United States up as a bastion of safety from gun violence, not when the problem is on both sides of the border.
? Richelieu-- Can't comprehend sarcasm? I wasn't holding up the US as a bastion of gun safety. That is precisely the point. You don't achieve safety by unilateral disarmament. Laws only affect the law abiding.
As to the divine right to carry arms, I'd like to think I have the same right to self-defense as a cactus or a jellyfish, much less an insect or vertebrate. All of nature enjoys that right, which may be what the founders meant by "Nature's God," from whom they said our rights derived. Humans have carried weapons for about 2 million years now, long before the modern idea of "proletariat" was invented. Check your own facts.
The citizen-soldier was common in the ancient world, from Egypt to Sumer to Sparta, ancient Gauls left their farms to fight Rome, etc. Ancient warfare was scheduled around the growing season, until Phillip of Macedon.
I have a black belt. Guns are safer. Better range. Less work. A much better bet for a cocktail waitress leaving her bar at 2AM.
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