Attack of Second Amendment Troublesome At Best, Criminal At Worst

Those who seek to take away our Constitutional rights whether it be during a robbery, mugging, car-jacking, home-invasion or any other means, or by taking control of a country, must be preceded by a removal of arms from the populace. It cannot happen any other way. Our Second Amendment right to bear arms keeps that from happening even if we never fire our weapons. Their very presence is a deterrent. Once they are taken, we are helpless victims.

The United Nations has long been a thorn in the side of America and rails consistently against our sovereignty, security, use of energy, position of power and laws which do not reflect the rest of the world’s views or privileges. Based in New York, the United Nations enjoys its prestigious location and takes advantage of the fact. We have nothing in common.

A statue, located outside the UN headquarters reflects their extreme anti-gun stance. It is a work of art depicting a revolver with the barrel twisted into a knot. Their stand on self-defense is appalling and is reflected in the United Nations Human Rights Council Subcommittee on Human Rights’ declaration that “no human has the right to self-defense”. (That should raise a few eyebrows!) It also states that there is however a “mandatory international human right to extremely restrictive gun control”.

The right to keep and bear arms is a fundamental right guaranteed by the Second Amendment much to the United Nation’s dismay. I consider the statue of a pistol with the barrel twisted into a knot which stands in front of the UN offensive as it seeks to debase and reject one of the pillars of our Constitution upon which this country was built.

To make matters worse, Obama has appointed Harold Koh legal adviser to the Department of State. A legal adviser should be a strong defender of America rights and liberties and should stand against any foreign interference with those rights. Koh’s purpose as he sees it is exactly the opposing view.
In the climate where so many politicians are seeking out international opinion in establishing legal opinion for us here in America, it is troublesome that a man in his position leans towards the United Nations to determine his conscience.

Koh considers the honoring of the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms a stand against a proposed “global ban on illicit transfer of small arms and light weapons”. He stated in a speech published in the “Fordham Law Review” in 2003 that, “If we really do care about human rights, we have to do something about the guns”. He obviously supports a global system of effective controls on small arms, thus allowing the global opinion to set the course for America.

He reinforced this belief when he stated, “too much work left undone. After a few sleepless nights, I wrote myself a list of issues on which I needed to do more in the years ahead. One of those issues was global regulation of small arms”. He apparently isn't content in the regulation of guns here at home but wishes to regulate handguns across the entire globe.

The Second Amendment is under attack as never before by narrow-minded liberals who haven’t a clue as to its importance or necessity. They ignore study after study that reinforces the fact that communities and states with legal carry permits have few gun-related crimes, fewer gun-related suicides and even fewer children harmed in handgun accidents. The facts simply do not bear out their twisted paranoia.

According to the FBI during the first six months of 2008 nationwide violent crime fell 3.5%. In fact, since 1991, the violent crime rate fell more than 40% proving that in spite of alarmists and anti-gun advocates, the rise in gun sales has not increased gun-related or even violent crime over all.
While school shootings and gun-related violence is always a tragedy, it is far from the norm. With over 110 million households being the registered owners of at least one firearm and being law-abiding citizens, the few that use guns violently are by far the minority. In fact, most criminals who use guns in their “trade” are not registered gun owners anyway. New gun restrictions and laws will not affect them in the least but will only impair honest citizens in the exercise of their constitutional right to bear arms.

The number of instances of crimes being stopped and lives saved because a trained person with a legal carry permit was on the scene and acted appropriately is rarely reported by the basically anti-gun press. Of course every misuse of a firearm signals another chance for them to rally around the “Take the guns away” sentiment and those stories are reported over and over.

Even former President Jimmy Carter is getting into the act once again. Unsuccessful in passing his gun control legislation while president, he is pushing for it again. He recently said that anyone who owner a semi-automatic weapon was a “killer in waiting”. He says that the reason people own such weapons is because of their desire to shoot up schools or a workplace or to murder policemen seeing how many bodies we can pile up before ending the spree with our own suicide. His lack of knowledge is astounding, and his accusations insulting.

Speaking of the National Rifle Associations efforts to fight gun control legislation, Carter tried to side step the move to outlaw guns when he said, “The NRA would be justified in its efforts if there was a real threat to our constitutional right to bear arms. But that is not the case”. In all actually, his drive to ban “assault weapons” and the labeling which guns are to be considered such at the whim of politicians, is a real threat.
Although President Obama says he isn’t considering taking our guns, proposed legislation and restrictions by numerous politicians are making it difficult to find certain popular firearms, reloading materials and tools, and ammunition. As ammo becomes much more scarce owing a gun will be of little practical use. After all, what is the value of a handgun for self-defense if it cannot be loaded because bullets cannot be purchased or cost so much that no one can afford to buy them? Such efforts are simply back-door attempts to do what they say they aren’t doing, removing our right to defend ourselves.
Every country that has enacted gun bans against private ownership has experienced sky-rocketing gun-related crimes. And rightly so because the criminals who seek to use their guns illegally don’t register guns and don’t turn them in. Such bans only adversely affect law-abiding citizens who wish to be responsible for the safety of themselves and the ones they love.

The threat is being multiplied with Obama’s nomination of Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court as she has long been anti gun ownership. She believes that the Second Amendment does not entitle states to establish gun laws of their own but should rely upon the federal government to do as it wills on this issue.

I remember reading a Supreme Court decision in a case where the police of a town were being sued because they did not show up fast enough when called to stop a crime in which someone was killed. The Court ruled that we have no constitutional right to expect to be protected by the police department which is basically there to react to the crime and follow-up. Self-defense is actually on us.
The debate on this issue is far from over but every politician should be made aware of our belief that constitutional rights guaranteed to us by the Constitution of the United States and the Bill of Rights must be defended vehemently by those who are swore to represent the people of the United States. If they don’t understand that, or refuse to act accordingly, the voting booth is a powerful persuader and we will use it to replace them with someone that understands our determination to have our rights protected by those we put into office.

This issue obviously means little to the elite but to common folks, especially in the South, it is very important. However, anytime a fundamental right such as given to us in the Second Amendment is threatened by misguided and ill-informed politicians, every American should stand up and take notice.

Even if you choose not to keep and bear arms, which is also your right, the liberties you personally hold dear may be next on the “Endangered Rights List”.