The most hated Supreme Court in our lifetimes is about to step into the shit again-- this time over gun rights. The illegitimate Trump Court is expected to strike down a New York state law that limits the rights to carry a concealed handgun... because to 5 or 6 of the very far right bozos on the Court, carrying a concealed handgun is obviously a well-regulated militia. The decision will likely come down next week. This morning, The Hill reported that "The New York law requires concealed carry applicants to demonstrate that they have a special need for the license, beyond a basic desire for self-defense. New York’s tight restriction is among eight states and the District of Columbia that give wide discretion to licensing officials over these determinations. The Department of Justice, on behalf of the Biden administration, argued in support of New York and urged the court to defer to the longstanding practice of allowing legislatures to place reasonable limits on firearms to protect public safety. But during oral argument in November, the conservative majority on the Supreme Court seemed skeptical of New York’s strict limits on the carrying of guns outside the home... [I]t’s likely the law will be struck down as unconstitutional and that, as a result, lawmakers could be left with fewer options for regulating firearms."
Uvalde is a pretty red county. Biden didn't quite get 40% of the vote there in 2020, performing slightly worse than Hillary did. Last time Greg Abbott was on the ballot-- the 2018 Texas gubernatorial election-- he got 4,756 votes (60.2%) compared to just 3,070 (38.8%) for Democrat Lupe Valdez. The gun massacre woke the citizens of the county up a bit and Abbott is unlikely to do as well in Uvalde this coming November. On Sunday, both President Biden and Governor Abbott visited the the Robb Elementary School memorial at different times. Biden was warmly welcomed and cheered. Abbott got a very different kind of reception; he was jeered and booed. Remember, these people didn't vote for Biden; they divot for Abbott.
Abbott came under fire this week after commenting that the mass shooting "could've been worse." He also blamed mass shootings on mental health concerns, despite there being no concrete evidence that the Texas gunman had a mental illness.
Abbott has consistently pushed for relaxed gun restrictions in Texas. In 2021, he supported a series of laws to expand gun rights and access, including one that makes it legal to carry a handgun without a license.
He also tweeted in 2015 that he was "embarrassed" about Texas being the second-ranked state in the number of gun purchases, telling Texans to "pick up the pace."
During Abbott's tenure as governor, there have been six mass shootings in the state. But even after the mass shooting in Uvalde, Abbott declined to endorse new gun restrictions while indicating in a speech to the NRA that "laws have not stopped madmen from carrying out evil acts on innocent people in peaceful communities."
Far right insurrectionist Mo Brooks, a runoff candidate for the open Alabama Senate seat, didn't go to Uvalde; he went to Fox News Sunday to show Alabama voters what an extremist crackpot he is-- just like them. Before fighting with the host over Trump's Big Lie, which Brooks is an integral part of-- he went off on guns, guns, guns...
Well, let's, for emphasis, understand what the Second Amendment is about. The Second Amendment is designed to help ensure that we, the citizenry, always have the right to take back our government should it become dictatorial. That was a great fear of the Founding Fathers and, quite frankly, it's a fear today.
And as long as we enjoy un-infringed Second Amendment rights, then we don't really have to worry that much about the government ever becoming dictatorial. But the moment that we take from our citizenry our ability to take our government back is the moment that the ability of dictatorial forces increases to the point where perhaps they will try to implement a dictatorial government at the federal level.
So I want to protect the Second Amendment right to bear arms. The amendment is very clear. It says the right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed. If there are proposals out there that guarantee the rights of the American people to freely exercise their Second Amendment right to bear and keep arms, then I'll consider them.
But if you're talking about depriving people of their Second Amendment right to bear arms-- well, first, it's unconstitutional. So you're going to have to address that with a constitutional amendment, and we'll see how Congress and the states react to that kind of measure.
But second, it's not the proper way to go if you want to preserve our freedoms. And I say that having been the target of an assassination attempt on the baseball field in Virginia where 170-some-odd bullets were fired over about a seven-minute period of time.
So I've been in the middle of one of these things and I was a primary target of the assassin where he had my name, my physical description in his pocket at the time he launched this attack.
What we have to do is stop the motivation that causes these criminals, these horrific individuals, to do what they do.
Told by host Sandra Smith that Gallup finds that 52% of Americans want stricter gun control laws, Brooks simply denied the accuracy of the polling: "I suggest that the polling data that you have does not reflect of the opinions of the American people. I suspect that the people who were polled, by way of example, were not properly explained what the purpose of the Second Amendment right to bear arms is... If we teach proper moral values, it would teach respect for human life, if we properly address mental health issues that may somehow or another be associated with all these things, then that is the way to fix the problem." Watch the reason why a million kids-- or a couple dozen congressional Republicans would have be murdered-- before the GOP would ever allow sane gun control measures: