Tag: QotD

Quote of the Day – NRA Overreach Edition

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Quote of the Day – NRA Overreach* Edition

The NRA, the same people who tried to derail Parker v. D.C. (which later became D.C. v. Heller) has announced that the Supreme Court has granted their motion to allow them to participate in the upcoming oral argument of McDonald v. Chicago. The email I received this morning states:

“We are pleased with the Court’s decision to grant our motion,” said Chris W. Cox, NRA’s chief lobbyist. “NRA’s solitary goal in McDonald is to ensure that that our fundamental, individual right to keep and bear arms applies to all law-abiding Americans, regardless of the state in which they live. We are hopeful that the Court will share our view that the Framers of the Fourteenth Amendment clearly intended to apply the Second Amendment to the States.”

It goes on to say that the NRA will be represented by former U.S. Solicitor General Paul Clement.

According to The Volokh Conspiracy, there’s been a little exchange between Clement and Heller litigator Alan Gura:

The end of the (Blog of Legal Times) post includes some interesting commentary by both Clement and Gura. First, Clement comments:

“I think the grant of the NRA’s motion may signal that the Court is interested in ensuring that all the avenues to incorporation, including the due process clause, are fully explored at the argument. Of course, I look forward to working with Alan.”

Gura responds, showing his typical civility and grace:

“The suggestion that I wouldn’t present all the arguments to the Court was uncalled for. I hope that this time Paul understands that handgun bans are unconstitutional.“

As the BLT notes, the dig against Clement reflects the brief he filed as Solicitor General in 2007 arguing on behalf of the United States that the D.C. handgun ban was not necessarily unconstitutional.

The bolded portion is today’s QotD. Give ’em hell Alan!

(* In the interests of full disclosure, I am a Patron member of the NRA. That’s two steps above Life and one below Benefactor. But I hardly think they walk on water and their farts don’t stink.)

Quote of the Day – Politics Edition

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This is not the QotD, it’s the prelude:

President Obama is a beguiling but confounding figure. As he has said of himself: “I serve as a blank screen on which people of vastly different political stripes project their own views.” (”The Audacity of Hope.”) It is indeed audacious that he should proclaim this consciously disingenuous attribute. And, as one reads his inaugural address, it is hard not to conclude that it was shrewdly crafted to perpetuate such confusion.

Run-of-the-mill politicians try to hide their duplicity. Only the most gifted of that profession brag that they intend to confound and confuse the public. Such an effort is beyond ingenious – it is brazenly ingenuous. — Tony Blankley, The Washington Times, Obama’s Blank Screen, 1/27/2009

THIS is the QotD:

When folks on the left or center-left express disillusionment and dismay that President Obama hasn’t governed as some sort of pragmatic non-ideologue who unites the country, takes the middle road, and keeps the pork and yuck out of government, it seems to me that the fault lies not with Obama. It lies with the people who bizarrely believed Obama would do otherwise in the first place.

There was never any objective, factual basis for believing that President Obama would be any other way than what we are seeing. Apparently, a large chunk of Obama’s voting base consisted of people who invented some sort of counterfactual, reality-immune fantasy in their head and then voted for that fantasy when ticking ‘Obama’ on their ballots. I’m sure there are plenty of valid criticisms to be made of President Obama, but the fact that the real President Obama doesn’t correspond to naive, irrational voters’ fantasies doesn’t strike me as one of them. — Rhymes with Cars and Girls, The Disillusioned Center-Left’s Case Against Obama: He’s Just Not Living Up To All That Stuff We Made Up About Him In Our Heads

In the run-up to the election, no one was interested in objective, fact-based analysis of candidate Obama – least of all the media, whose job it (normally) is to provide such analysis. Instead, they too projected what they wanted upon his blank screen, and thrills ran up their legs when he spoke, regardless of whatever duplicitous, disingenuous words emerged from his mouth.

In the words of a man Obama once swore he could not disown (but later did), Obama’s CHICKENS, are coming home to ROOST!

Not that it’ll make much of a difference.

Hat tip to Vanderleun for the second quote, who adds in another piece:

I’d like to get off of Obama as a constant subject. I really would. It’s just that the man is a walking, non-talking, wall-to-wall, floor-to-ceiling, gaffe and lie machine. I’ve been watching presidents since Eisenhower and I’ve never seen one one-tenth as twisted as this one.

And we’ve got three more years of this to look forward to.

Quote of the Day – Peggy Noonan Edition

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Quote of the Day – Peggy Noonan Edition

Our national politics are reflecting what appears to be going on geologically, on the bottom of the oceans and beneath the crust of the Earth: the tectonic plates are moving.

America never stops moving now.

Massachusetts said, “Yes, we want change, but the change we want is not the change that has been delivered by the Democratic administration and the Democratic Congress. So we will turn elsewhere.”

We are in a postromantic political era. They hire you and fire you, nothing personal. Family connection, personal charm, old traditions, fealty to party, all are nice and have their place, but right now we are immersed in crisis, and we vote on policies that affect our lives.

The Lefty pundits are quick to point out that a majority of people want “health care reform.” What they avoid assiduously is that – at least until recently – a majority of Americans supported “gun control” too.

Until they saw the bills that were actually proposed. When they saw those, the response was overwhelmingly “Not THAT!!“ This is the reaction the House and Senate “Health Care Reform” bills have produced in the electorate:


And they won’t listen. They know better. Well, the election of Scott Brown just got their attention.

In Honor of the MA Special Election

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In Honor of the MA Special Election

A Quote of the Day taken from the header at Primeval Papa, the blog of my Fearless (former) Leader:

There is something about a Republican that you can only stand him just so long; and on the other hand, there is something about a Democrat that you can’t stand him quite that long. — Will Rogers

I could not think up a more apt quotation for this day!

Quote of the Day – Sociology Edition

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Quote of the Day – Sociology Edition

I’ve been saving this one for a while now:

There is a certain tier of our personal and societal operating system that is herd based. Unless you have both the capacity and will to transcend this, your operative mode will be primarily that of a herd member.

Most humans are neither interested in, nor capable of, the sort of extended autonomous operations that is the signature of herd transcendence.

Kings are nothing more than the herd alphas, who have fought their way to the top of the stack using the operating methods of herd pecking order, which is sometimes gross physical combat and sometimes not.

Our libertarian concept of “neither seeking to rule, nor accept being ruled” is fundamentally revolutionary: it fundamentally removes the fully operational human from the herd context. It is a qualitative difference between humans, and our society, America, is one of the few (only?) to even attempt to recognize, foster and celebrate this.

Which is all fine and dandy, until the herd, which hasn’t gone away, goes WTF?

— TheGeekWithA.45 in the comment thread to Entropy Happens from last September.

And on that note, I rejoin the herd workforce!

Quote of the Day – Avatar Edition

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Mr. Cameron, you ought to get down on your knees and thank whatever passes for your dear and fluffy blue $DEITY for the restraint that real flesh and blood redneck NRA supporters who don’t inhabit your fantasy world have historically shown, and continue to show, in the face of attitudes like that.

We’re not the Nazis, dipwad. We’re the people hiding the Jews.

Who are you?

That’s the GeekWithA.45 responding to the news that James Cameron holds “redblooded redneck NRA supporters” in low esteem.

Good point, Geek, and an excellent question.

Quote of the Day – Leviathan Edition

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Quote of the Day – Leviathan Edition

The state is not your friend.
— Perry de Havilland at Samizdata, commenting on this story of a young mother “warned” by police for “brandishing” a knife from inside her kitchen at a couple of thugs in her back yard. RTWT.

This is the same story that yesterday’s QotD came from. Apparently Ms. Klass is a celebrity. Had she been just an ordinary Jane Doe, I don’t doubt she’d have been more than warned.