Conservative View of Parkland Shooting (Summary)

Federal Program Protected Parkland Shooter From Arrests

There was a federal program created by the Obama Administration to end the "school to prison pipeline." The Trump Administration is trying to cancel the program, but this is being hampered by legal action and administrative delays.

The program subsidized school counseling to replace arrests for criminal offenses on school grounds. This program meant that the Parkland shooter was counseled instead of arrested numerous times. The result was that the Parkland shooter was able to buy guns, because he lacked an arrest record, and the FBI couldn't find him, and didn't take tips about the Parkland shooter seriously, because there was no arrest record. Here's the best link on it, but there are more, if you need them.
https://www.realclearinvestigations.com/articles/2018/02/28/obama_administration_school_discipline_policy_and_the_parkland_shooting.html

Here are some more links to how the program was developed, and how it was intended to work. Please note the emphasis on limiting arrests, regardless of the crimes committed. Here's 5 more links on the program. Some are in favor, some against:
https://www.realclearinvestigations.com/articles/2018/04/10/sperrybroward_art.html
https://www.tolerance.org/m...
http://neatoday.org/2015/01...
https://www.usatoday.com/st...
https://www.city-journal.or...
https://veneremurcernui.wor...

Gun Restraining Orders Are the Best Way to Address the Problem

School shooters generally have noticeable mental and social problems.  The system generally knows about these individuals, like the Parkland shooter, but claims it can’t do anything about them.  First, authorities need to arrest and jail them if they commit assaults on teachers or other students.  That gives them an arrest record and warns the potential perpetrators not to go any farther.  But now there’s a new tool, a gun restraining order.  It gives authorities something between jail, or involuntary commitment in a mental institution, and letting a time bomb walk free.   After a hearing, a judge can remove the right of a defendant to own weapons.  The burden of proof is less than for involuntary commitment.  This was recently enacted into Florida law.  Gun Restraining Orders are supported by the NRA.

The Purpose of the Second Amendment

The purpose of an armed US populace is to check the federal government's ability to exceed its specified powers under the Constitution.  This argument was put forward as a rebuttal to arguments against the Constitution, that the federal government would have so much power that it would oppress the people and would be able to impose a military dictatorship.  See the last 2 paragraphs of Federalist Paper 46 in this link:

http://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/fed46.asp

The last two paragraphs of the link say that the Federal Government will not be able to abuse its power because the residents of America, unlike the residents of Europe, are armed with military grade weapons and would be able to organize themselves into militias that would outnumber the federal army.  Some argue that Federalist paper 46 is not the same as the 2^nd Amendment.  However, the same man, James Madison, wrote both of them, about 18 months apart.  Federalist Paper 46 was published 29 January 1788.  The Bill of Rights was introduced in Congress on June 8, 1789.  I think that Federalist Paper 46 is a good indication of James Madison’s intent in writing the 2^nd Amendment.

For those of you who would argue that people armed with AR-15s and other "assault weapons" would not be able to fight a federal army today, please consider the amount of time it took the Iraqi Army to take Mosul, even though it was using large amounts of US artillery and air strikes. It took over 9 months, from October 17, 2016, to late July, 2017, to take Mosul from ISIS. ISIS was armed mainly with AK-47 rifles (true assault rifles) and improvised explosives, with a few captured machine guns and mortars. I think this shows that the 2nd Amendment is still an effective check on the Federal Government.

You should also consider that there are at least 5 million privately owned "assault weapons" in the US, and there are over 300 million privately owned guns overall. This means that there is more than one gun for each US resident. There is no way you can confiscate all of the guns out there. Don't bother to deny that's what you really want. We don't trust you. "If you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor." Malarkey on steroids. The left lies for a living.

The typical pro-gun voter believes the 2nd Amendment is a guarantee that the rest of the Bill of Rights will not be canceled unconstitutionally by the federal government. They view any effort to curtail gun rights as the first step in an unlawful move towards dictatorship. Since the left is already trying to cancel Freedom of Religion and Freedom of Speech in places the left controls, like college campuses, pro-gun voters increasingly feel the left is not dealing in good faith. They are likely to resist violently any effort to confiscate guns or have the Supreme Court reinterpret the meaning of the 2nd Amendment. I don't see any way any grand compromise can be reached on this issue.

Self Defense is a Natural Human Right

Both the Founders and a substantial number of people today believe that self defense is a natural right.  Both the Founders and many people today believe that self defense requires military weapons.  If you don’t believe that, ask yourself how Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge were able to kill about a quarter of Cambodia’s population, about 2 million men, women and children, in the killing fields between 1975 and 1979.  Cambodians had no weapons to defend themselves with.  You say that could never happen in the US.  Before 1960, almost everyone would have said it could never happen in Cambodia either.  The Khmer Rouge Communists were an unprecedented event in Cambodian history.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khmer_Rouge_Killing_Fields

King Barack or King Donald

The left likes to accuse Trump of aspiring to be king.  I just don't see it.  Trump has moved to give up executive authority, not extend it.  However, Barry the Brilliant not only thought he could be king, he acted like he was king by divine right, aka "the fierce urgency of now." Trump is just forcing Congress to do its job to change immigration law according to the Constitution. The left hates checks and balances, and thinks judges should rule based on what they want the law to be, rather than what the law is. The left also thinks good manners are more important than good policy or the faithful execution of the law. The left has a theoretically brilliant program that's never worked in the real world. So the left lies constantly, because the truth would screw them. Example: "If you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor, period."

The left is projecting what they would do on Trump.  But Trump is too lazy to want to run everything.  He's much happier restoring Constitutional government where the president has limited powers, and more free time.

Better Alternatives to Net Neutrality

Net neutrality was the wrong solution.  It just added more government regulations to solve a problem caused by government regulations.  The solution should be to remove the regulations that grant ISP's monopolies free from competition.

ISP's monopoly power comes from control of the "last mile" that connects to your house.  Local governments, like the village I live in, grant exclusive rights to a single ISP.  Nobody else can string coax or fiber in the local government's area.  Congress can outlaw this practice because it's local governments interfering with interstate commerce.

There's also a lot of reserved TV spectrum that could be used for super wifi.  Local TV spectrum is reserved for TV whether it's used or not.  In smaller markets, with only a few TV stations, there is a whole lot of idle spectrum that could be reallocated to provide broadband Internet over the air.  The spectrum could be auctioned off to raise revenue for the Feds.  In low density rural areas, this might be the only way to provide high speed internet.

What Police Didn't Do at Charlottesville

The key to understanding what happened at Charlottesville is what the police didn't do. They didn't keep the white supremacists separated from the Antifa / BLM counter protesters. Keeping the two sides separated is standard procedure in a volatile situation like a white supremacist Nazi march. So why didn't the police keep the two groups separated? The Charlottesville police had agreed to keep the two sides separated, according to Hunter Wallace, a supporter of the white supremacist marchers at Charlottesville. In his blog, as quoted in the LA Times article linked below, he says, "Violent antifa [anti-fascists] were not penned in their own area as per our agreement with the Charlottesville Police Department, but were roaming the streets and blocking the entrance to Lee Park." I think the local Democrat officials and the Governor of Virginia wanted a violent confrontation to stir up racial division. I think they ordered the police not to keep the two groups separated. There are strong rumors that the cops were ordered to stand down. This tactic of withdrawing police protection to facilitate a convenient riot is common in places like Venezuela where the left uses street violence to advance their cause politically. I believe that this riot was intentionally permitted, because the Democrats in charge thought it would embarrass Trump and Republicans in general. It certainly worked better than they could have dreamed. This is just speculation on my part, but I hope some brave journalists will investigate and see justice done.

Who was responsible for the violence in Charlottesville? Here's what witnesses say