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Friday, September 1, 2017

Suicidal Americans and those planning Shooting Sprees have rights, "even when the choices they make are wrong."

I have been holding onto an email my conservative friend in Milwaukee sent me for some time now, because...well, you be the judge. Here's the subject line:


What?

Right wingers have gone so far over the deep end that even suicides and shooting sprees aren't enough to put some kind of limit on firearms? Even supposed constitutional purists like activist Justice Antonin Scalia thought there should be limits...but you won't hear that from Republicans today:
Scalia left some gifts for liberals in his Heller ruling. He wrote that the right to bear arms had limits. “Nothing in our opinion should be taken to cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, or laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings, or laws imposing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms.” The late justice also more generally offered the belief that “like most rights, the right secured by the Second Amendment is not unlimited.” It is “not a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose.”
Like the first part of the 2nd Amendment, conservative gun nuts have simply ignored the parts of the Heller decision they don't like. But it's hard to argue against the logic, much less the chance to save lives:
OregonLive: Lawmakers in both the state House and Senate have agreed to new a policy limiting gun use ... allows family members and police officers to petition for guns to be taken away from a people who show risk of harming themselves or others ... a judge could issue an "extreme risk protection order" against a person deemed at risk of committing suicide or shooting others. The person would have 24 hours to hand over their guns to law enforcement before having officers take them away. Senate Bill 719 narrowly passed the House 31-28, with no support from Republicans and "no" votes by three Democrats. It now heads to Gov. Kate Brown for her signature.
And yet, Republicans who have used the "slippery slope" argument to repeal all gun related laws are using that same argument to kill common sense legislation. Apparently suicidal individuals and shooting spree lunatics have rights, "even when the choices they make are wrong." Really?
House Minority Leader Mike McLane, R-Powell Butte, said it was difficult for him to oppose the bill because he knows it's meant to help people. But he said he feared Oregonians' rights would be infringed by judges ordering their guns taken away. "People do have rights," McLane said, "even when the choices they make are wrong."

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