Political Polarity To Reverse On Gun Control, States' Rights?

[Anthony '58]

Now that the conservatives are the "ins" and the liberals the "outs," will we now see a return to the days of the left seeking a "Second Amendment solution" to what they see as the nation's problems - the days of the Black Panthers ambushing police officers en masse, the Weather Underground blowing up buildings, and the "Zebra shootings" of whites in and around San Francisco?

On the cause of states' rights, a role reversal is even more likely - as voters defied the federal government on both raising the minimum wage and legalizing recreational marijuana use Tuesday, with ballot initiatives on those two issues going a combined eight for nine.  And with the repeal of ObamaCare now imminent, liberal states - and even some conservative ones; e.g., Utah - are sure to move heaven and earth to see to it that the newly uninsured are given some sort of safety net.

And according to this piece, states' rights could be the key to diffusing the Culture Wars once and for all:

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http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/proje...ia-fits-in

Can Trump End The Culture Wars?

By Daniel K. Williams

Donald J. Trump was elected with a higher percentage of the white evangelical vote than any other Republican presidential candidate has ever received, and he has received strong support from prominent Christian Right leaders. Yet if Mr. Trump delivers on his promises, he will not give the religious right what its leaders have traditionally demanded or what the Republican Party platform calls for. Indeed, he will give them very little national legislation at all, but will instead offer them maximum latitude to pursue their agenda at the state level — a shift that may portend a potential breakthrough in the nation’s polarizing culture wars.

National legislation has long been the goal of the religious right. When the movement emerged in the late 1970s, evangelical leaders such as Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson sought federal constitutional amendments to ban abortion and restore school prayer, because they wanted to reverse what liberal rights activists had done at the national level through the Supreme Court. In the early 21st century, leaders such as James Dobson continued this trend by persuading President George W. Bush to endorse a constitutional amendment proposal to define marriage as exclusively heterosexual.

In recent years, evangelicals have become so concerned about protecting their own religious liberty against federal mandates or court decisions that they have given less attention to imposing a moral agenda on the rest of the nation. Although the Republican Party platform continues to promise a constitutional amendment protecting human life from the moment of conception, the pro-life movement has not made any serious attempts to pass that amendment since the 1980s. Nor has there been much talk in the last decade of a national ban on same-sex marriage.

Mr. Trump is well positioned to promote a further shift away from national moral regulation. For much of his adult life, he held culturally libertarian views on abortion and gay rights, and he evinced little interest in the religious right’s agenda. Early in his campaign, he expressed discomfort with conservative evangelicals’ opposition to the rights of transgender people to use the public restroom of their choice. But he quickly came to embrace a “states’ rights” position on same-sex marriage and transgender rights, a position that would allow culturally liberal New Yorkers the right to pursue different policies than cultural conservatives in Mississippi or North Dakota. And while Mr. Trump stumbled over abortion during his campaign, the policy that he ultimately reverted to was to leave abortion legalization up to the states — an outcome that he would try to ensure by nominating conservative Supreme Court justices who might overturn Roe v. Wade.

Mr. Trump has gone further than any previous Republican presidential nominee in a generation in insisting that the religious right should enact its agenda at the state, rather than federal, level. Although this was the policy position of many Republicans during the 1970s (including President Gerald Ford), religious right activists persuaded the G.O.P. in the early 1980s to abandon its states-rights approach to abortion and other social issues, and promise national legislation to implement the religious right’s agenda. Mr. Trump is leading the party back to its more traditional stance.

While many liberals will find this outcome unsatisfactory — since it offers them no opportunity to secure national protection for individual rights that they consider inalienable — it may be the only compromise solution that can give both conservatives and liberals the freedom to pursue their own agenda at the local level without fear of a national backlash.

If a socially libertarian New Yorker can deliver this compromise to the conservative white rural evangelical voters who put him in office, both conservatives and liberals should see that for what it is: a landmark opportunity to move beyond the culture wars.

Daniel K. Williams is a professor of history at the University of West Georgia and the author of “God’s Own Party: The Making of the Christian Right."

[Warren Dew]

Certainly a lot of Democrats seem to have become second amendment supporters during the GWBush administration.

[Bob Butler 54]

Massachusetts had Romney Care before it was integrated with the national Obama Care.  I'm somewhat concerned as my own health care depends on the federal Obama Care which could be repealed or gutted, but I expect Massachusetts would revert to its state plan should this happen.

Letting the states experiment with their own solutions without one size fits all federal coercion might be for the best on some issues.  the 2nd Amendment makes this difficult for the gun issue, though.

[Anthony '58]

But now Republicans are talking about adding a provision to the ObamaCare repeal bill specifically barring individual states from adopting it or "anything substantially similar;" i.e., RomneyCare in Massachusetts.

It might be time for Senate Democrats to try a new tactic - a filibuster being impossible in this instance due to the budget reconciliation process the Republicans intend on using to repeal ObamaCare: "Taking a walk" - to deny the Republicans the required "quorum" to pass it.

[Warren Dew]

(11-12-2016, 07:58 AM)Anthony Wrote: But now Republicans are talking about adding a provision to the ObamaCare repeal bill specifically barring individual states from adopting it or "anything substantially similar;" i.e., RomneyCare in Massachusetts.

Citation needed.

[Eric the Green]

The second amendment solution on The Left was never a large movement, as the Black panthers were not. Leftists talk about it, but nothing much comes of it. It would be a new situation if it happened. It was the right-wing, of course, that armed itself in 1860, but then they set up their own state and recruited an army, and almost got foreign help. It has been the right wing recently that has formed armed militias. No need for that now until the Left takes over again.

If it ever does. Right now it looks like noway is getting his way, along with Galen, Warren, Copperfield, etc. I have my doubts whether any kind of neo-socialism will ever have much more than a temporary majority in a country that, even with the supposed demographic changes, keeps voting election after election for right-wing Republicans to control everything. Even in late 2009 a neo-socialist/green lite majority was blocked by DINOs in the Senate and we got Obamacare instead of health care reform, and full answers to climate change were blocked, etc.

How much can the Republicans repeal in the same way they repeal Obamacare? How far can they go? Ryan wants to abolish the entire Great Society and New Deal. Do the Democratic Senators, some of them up for re-election in red states, have the cajones to stop him?

The Republican majority in this nation has a neo-liberal vision of this country where the poor get poorer and the rich get richer. Middle class decline has been their goal too, since they took over (apparently permanently) in 1980. White/Color aparteid is in their sights as well. If Anthony is right about the Feds blocking the states from setting up their own neo-socialist or green policies, then secession for the minority of blue states is the only answer if the people there want anything other than a banana republic USA. Civil war may be the price for this, if Trump or his successor Ivanka want to enforce the union.

[Warren Dew]

(11-12-2016, 02:28 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: Right now it looks like noway is getting his way, along with Galen, Warren, Copperfield, etc.

That would sure be nice.  I doubt the way will be as smooth as you paint it, though.

[Classic-Xer]

(11-12-2016, 07:58 AM)Anthony Wrote: But now Republicans are talking about adding a provision to the ObamaCare repeal bill specifically barring individual states from adopting it or "anything substantially similar;" i.e., RomneyCare in Massachusetts.

It might be time for Senate Democrats to try a new tactic - a filibuster being impossible in this instance due to the budget reconciliation process the Republicans intend on using to repeal ObamaCare: "Taking a walk" - to deny the Republicans the required "quorum" to pass it.

Probably wise not to establish a new precedence that can be used against them in the future.

[Galen]

(11-12-2016, 10:41 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(11-12-2016, 07:58 AM)Anthony Wrote: But now Republicans are talking about adding a provision to the ObamaCare repeal bill specifically barring individual states from adopting it or "anything substantially similar;" i.e., RomneyCare in Massachusetts.

It might be time for Senate Democrats to try a new tactic - a filibuster being impossible in this instance due to the budget reconciliation process the Republicans intend on using to repeal ObamaCare: "Taking a walk" - to deny the Republicans the required "quorum" to pass it.

Probably wise not to establish a new precedence that can be used against them in the future.

If they had left the cloture rules alone they wouldn't be having this problem.

[Anthony '58]

The first test could be if the Republicans try to pass a federal "right to work" law - but this will be impossible without a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate.

And how isn't right-to-work an "unjust taking of property" (goods or services) since the freeloaders receive the same pay and benefit increases the union successfully negotiates as dues payers?  Has this ever been taken up by the courts?

[David Horn]

(12-10-2016, 01:24 PM)Anthony Wrote: The first test could be if the Republicans try to pass a federal "right to work" law - but this will be impossible without a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate.

And how isn't right-to-work an "unjust taking of property" (goods or services) since the freeloaders receive the same pay and benefit increases the union successfully negotiates as dues payers?  Has this ever been taken up by the courts?

Virginia just rejected adding Right to Work to the state constitution, even though this law has been in existence here for over 60 years.  That idea may have finally exceeded its sell-by date.  Until recently, the narrative was totally under the control of the Chamber of Commerce.  Not so much now.

[pbrower2a]

The Center-Left (the mainstream of the Democratic Party) is still convinced that well-used words that relate reality and suggest alternatives are still more effective than violence.

[Anthony '58]

And what about the individual states' ability to set a higher minimum wage than the federal minimum wage? Might this come under fire - from either a Republican Congress or a Republican-packed Supreme Court, which could rule such wages illegal under the "commerce clause" or some such thing?

[David Horn]

(12-14-2016, 09:56 AM)Anthony Wrote: And what about the individual states' ability to set a higher minimum wage than the federal minimum wage?  Might this come under fire - from either a Republican Congress or a Republican-packed Supreme Court, which could rule such wages illegal under the "commerce clause" or some such thing?

Precedent alone will prevent that, as much as they wish to do harm.  A Federal law prohibiting the entire concept of a minimum wage may fly though.

[Anthony '58]

Which is why a filibuster-proof Republican Senate majority is likely to lead to an immediate Second Civil War, which could result in individual states as well as the Union breaking up; e.g., Philadelphians would want no part of joining Red America, and would be geographically coterminous with "East Pakistan" - the West Coast forming a "West Pakistan" - and that's exactly how Fox News etc. would calumniously characterize it (so as to link the Blues with our Muslim foreign adversary).

And "Bleeding Arizona" could become a 21st Century "Bleeding Kansas," as residents of the neighboring blue states pour into Arizona to make "West Pakistan" coterminous (even seizing control of southern Arizona would be good enough, and that's the most liberal part of the state as matters stand).

[Eric the Green]

[Bob Butler 54]

(01-30-2017, 12:47 PM)X_4AD_84 Wrote: That is a pretty useless map.

Unless it's broken down by gun crimes, suicides and justifiable defense situations, it is completely meaningless.

The other factor, albeit non PC to some, it demographics. Some of the highest rates are in places with one or more of the following:
1. A large economically challenged rural and / or Rust Belt white population.
2. A significant Native American population.
3. A significant rural historically disadvantaged Black population.

Interestingly, the Latinos don't seem to shoot themselves or other people all that much. Nor do Asians.

Correct. There is little or no correlation between gun policy and homicide rates. There is lots and lots of correlation with economics, culture and drug use, as you begin to indicate above.

American homicides have come way down since the 1980s. We are now in the same basic neighborhood as Europe. This doesn't mean that we as a society don't have problems, and that some of these problems relate to guns. Alas, the heart of these problems relate to drugs and economics, not gun policy.

However, a lot of folks are dissatisfied with the War on Drugs. I'm one of them. Lots of energy is spent with little return. Prohibition is difficult to impossible. If the people want something, someone will find a way to get it to them. The primary result of prohibition is to offer the criminally inclined an opportunity to profit.

A lot of other folks won't want a return to the War on Poverty, at least not as it was attempted in LBJ's time. Red America seems allergic to the notion of working towards an inclusive economy.

I don't know how to change the conversation.

[Bob Butler 54]

(01-30-2017, 12:50 PM)X_4AD_84 Wrote: Speaking of guns, and the implied deep militia embedded in the whole of The People ... I mean, it's visually impressive to muster large crowds of mostly peaceful protestors at airports and in downtown areas. But if the forces of Doom start to come for people in an organized manner, protestors can be mowed down quickly.

I had some time this weekend at the work bench.

There was lots of sliding, snicking and clicking to be heard.

Everything was found to be in good working order.

I do need to do something about getting longer range rifles. That is an admitted gap. I am in great shape for close quarters / tactical.

Not surprised by the above.  I suspect there has been no lack of sliding, snicking and clicking around various work benches.

Have you heard of any attempts to organize, to go beyond individuals acting alone?  There is an abundance of non-violent protest against Trump.  I haven't seen reports of violence, yet.  I haven't even seen propaganda calling for violence yet.  I haven't been looking particularly hard, though.  Have you seen it?

That it hasn't happened yet doesn't mean that it can't or won't happen.  If Trump disregards non-violent protest, things could change.  Too soon for that.  We'll see where things are a month or three down stream.

[Eric the Green]

(01-30-2017, 02:53 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote:

(01-30-2017, 12:50 PM)X_4AD_84 Wrote: Speaking of guns, and the implied deep militia embedded in the whole of The People ... I mean, it's visually impressive to muster large crowds of mostly peaceful protestors at airports and in downtown areas. But if the forces of Doom start to come for people in an organized manner, protestors can be mowed down quickly.

I had some time this weekend at the work bench.

There was lots of sliding, snicking and clicking to be heard.

Everything was found to be in good working order.

I do need to do something about getting longer range rifles. That is an admitted gap. I am in great shape for close quarters / tactical.

Not surprised by the above.  I suspect there has been no lack of sliding, snicking and clicking around various work benches.

Have you heard of any attempts to organize, to go beyond individuals acting alone.  There is an abundance of non-violent protest against Trump.  I haven't seen reports of violence, yet.  I haven't even seen propaganda calling for violence yet.  I haven't been looking particularly hard, though.  Have you seen it?

That it hasn't happened yet doesn't mean that it can't or won't happen.  If Trump disregards non-violent protest, things could change.  Too soon for that.  We'll see where things are a month or three down stream.

At the protests in DC on Jan.20 by DisruptJ20, over 200 were arrested because of broken windows and cars. That included at least 6 journalists who may not have been released yet. Remember Drump considers the press "the opposition party." That's a quote.

[Bob Butler 54]

(01-30-2017, 02:56 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: At the protests in DC on Jan.20 by DisruptJ20, over 200 were arrested because of broken windows and cars. That included at least 6 journalists who may not have been released yet. Remember Drump considers the press "the opposition party." That's a quote.

That to me counts as an escalation of the spiral of violence. It's not as bad as shots fired, but it counts.