Name: Anonymous 2007-10-03 7:51
The ACLU: Defender of the Constitution, or bullshit partisan organization that sucks the dick of the democratic party and its constituency?
If the American Civil Liberties Union (henceforth to be referred to as the ACLU) really gave two shits about the constitution, why do they only give Congressman Ron Paul, the premier defender of the constitution, a mere 61% average life rating? Paul is known by many as the greatest defender of the constitution out of all the hundreds of people in the government - he doesn’t vote for anything unless he thinks it is authorized by the constitution, and he voted against the USA PATRIOT ACT every time, even in the time immediately after 9/11 when there was enormous terror-hysteria. Yes, Ron Paul received a mere 61%, even keeping this fact in mind. He voted against almost every expansion of the surveillance state, and gets a 61% rating. 61% is what, a D, E, or F (in terms of letter grade)? That is a FAILING grade.
HMM, lets see here…. In contrast…. HILLARY CLINTON, who voted Y-E-S on the USA PATRIOT ACT, has a 75% rating from the ACLU. Wow, what a non-biased scorecard you have, ACLU. Good job protecting the constitution you fucking partisan pieces of shit. Yes, if you look down the list of issues the ACLU represents, you notice that many of the things they support (such as abortion, affirmative action programs, certain government spending programs, etc) ARE NOT EVEN MENTIONED in the constitution, and would arguably even be PROHIBITED under the 10th Amendment! Perhaps the ACLU is more concerned with promoting the Democrat party and its candidates than to actually promote, protect, preserve, and defend the constitutional rights of the American people?
Some other candidate ratings:
Joe Biden (D): 75%
John Kerry (D) 80%
Barack Obama (D) 80%
Carl Levin (D) 83%
Debbie Stabenow (D) 83%
Frank Lautenburg (D) 83%
Chuck Schumer (D) 67%
John Rockefeller (D) 83%
And again, Ron Paul’s rating: 61%. Again, everyone I list above voted YES on the Patriot Act, while Ron Paul voted NO. Could it be, perhaps, that many of the things the ACLU ranks its candidates on have NOTHING to do with the constitution at all? Could it be that the ACLU is just a biased and SHITTY organization that is just out to promote left-wing social issues, or maybe just promote the democrat party?
http://www.ccrkba.org/pub/rkba/general/ACLU.htm
Yet, the ACLU gives conservative or libertarian candidates who vote FOR the constitution in these regards as well as many others LOW RATINGS. The ACLU opposes the nomination of strict constructionist judges that will faithfully interpret the constitution AS WRITTEN simply on the grounds that that would work against their left-wing issue positions.
The ACLU claims that the 2nd Amendment is not an individual right, and that this right only regards militias, not individuals.
The definition of "militia" :
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/dict.asp?Word=militia
So the dictionary has pretty much outlined this idea for us. The "militia" does not refer to the government military or police. The founders viewed militias as being composed of the people, just like the dictionary definition right there says. So basically, the government national guard, police, and military don't qualify as 'militias' according to the definitions presented above. The Second Amendment thus applies to private citizens, not to government-controlled fighting forces. I don't see a single definition present for 'militia' that would lead one to the conclusion that the word refers to a governmental fighting force. I see many indications that it quite simply refers to ordinary citizens.
The ACLU claims to neutral on guns, and claims to not take a position on this issue.
http://www.ccrkba.org/pub/rkba/general/ACLU.htm
But the fact is, the ACLU is NOT neutral. The argument that the 2nd Amendment is a collective right rather than an individual right is the argument of those who fight against groups like the NRA or GOA and other groups that support this right. By claiming the ACLU is neutral and that you view the 2nd Amendment as a collective right, rather than an individual right, you are not being neutral, you are being anti-2nd Amendment. If this weren't bad enough, you tend to endorse candidates who are also anti-2nd amendment as well.
This is not the only example of what I consider to be bias on the part of the ACLU. There are plenty of other amendments in the Constitution that I don't think you do a good job of supporting. What about the 10th amendment? There are a lot of Federal programs that would seem to violate the 10th amendment, yet I don't see the ACLU lifting a finger about it. Could it be that this is possibly because the constituency of the ACLU and that many of its members are left-wing democrats who support big-government, and omit sections of the constitution they aren't comfortable with, while putting liberal judges on the courts who will disregard rights that are clearly in the constitution while promoting those that are not even present?
You can't pick and choose from the Constitution. If you are going to point to the fourth amendment and say you have a right to privacy because it is the law of the land (the constitution), then that means in order to be consistent and not be hypocritical, you must also recognize the rest of the rights enshrined in the same document for the rest of the people.
How can the ACLU, as an organization that is supposedly out to defend the constitution, completely disregard and ignore the sections of the Constitution or Bill of Rights they find inconvenient, while using the sections they do find convenient to their advantage? The ACLU is more about promoting the democratic party than actually defending the constitutional rights of Americans.
Even if the right to keep and bear arms was not constitutionally guaranteed in the Second Amendment (I personally believe it IS), the ninth amendment also states that the rights of the people are not limmited to those expressed in the Bill of Rights.
Another thing to consider is that even if the 2nd Amendment doesn't protect the right to bear arms, and even if the 9th amendment doesn't, the 10th Amendment still should restrict the FEDERAL government's ability to legislate their gun policies onto the states and onto the private citizens of those states.
Some would argue that the interstate commerce clause would allow the Federal government to regulate this, but the word 'interstate' refers to commerce occurring on or crossing state lines, not commerce WITHIN the states. So if a person manufactures his own firearm, or purchases one from a local seller who is not anywhere near state lines, why would the ACLU not defend their rights?
If the American Civil Liberties Union (henceforth to be referred to as the ACLU) really gave two shits about the constitution, why do they only give Congressman Ron Paul, the premier defender of the constitution, a mere 61% average life rating? Paul is known by many as the greatest defender of the constitution out of all the hundreds of people in the government - he doesn’t vote for anything unless he thinks it is authorized by the constitution, and he voted against the USA PATRIOT ACT every time, even in the time immediately after 9/11 when there was enormous terror-hysteria. Yes, Ron Paul received a mere 61%, even keeping this fact in mind. He voted against almost every expansion of the surveillance state, and gets a 61% rating. 61% is what, a D, E, or F (in terms of letter grade)? That is a FAILING grade.
HMM, lets see here…. In contrast…. HILLARY CLINTON, who voted Y-E-S on the USA PATRIOT ACT, has a 75% rating from the ACLU. Wow, what a non-biased scorecard you have, ACLU. Good job protecting the constitution you fucking partisan pieces of shit. Yes, if you look down the list of issues the ACLU represents, you notice that many of the things they support (such as abortion, affirmative action programs, certain government spending programs, etc) ARE NOT EVEN MENTIONED in the constitution, and would arguably even be PROHIBITED under the 10th Amendment! Perhaps the ACLU is more concerned with promoting the Democrat party and its candidates than to actually promote, protect, preserve, and defend the constitutional rights of the American people?
Some other candidate ratings:
Joe Biden (D): 75%
John Kerry (D) 80%
Barack Obama (D) 80%
Carl Levin (D) 83%
Debbie Stabenow (D) 83%
Frank Lautenburg (D) 83%
Chuck Schumer (D) 67%
John Rockefeller (D) 83%
And again, Ron Paul’s rating: 61%. Again, everyone I list above voted YES on the Patriot Act, while Ron Paul voted NO. Could it be, perhaps, that many of the things the ACLU ranks its candidates on have NOTHING to do with the constitution at all? Could it be that the ACLU is just a biased and SHITTY organization that is just out to promote left-wing social issues, or maybe just promote the democrat party?
http://www.ccrkba.org/pub/rkba/general/ACLU.htm
Yet, the ACLU gives conservative or libertarian candidates who vote FOR the constitution in these regards as well as many others LOW RATINGS. The ACLU opposes the nomination of strict constructionist judges that will faithfully interpret the constitution AS WRITTEN simply on the grounds that that would work against their left-wing issue positions.
The ACLU claims that the 2nd Amendment is not an individual right, and that this right only regards militias, not individuals.
The definition of "militia" :
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/dict.asp?Word=militia
So the dictionary has pretty much outlined this idea for us. The "militia" does not refer to the government military or police. The founders viewed militias as being composed of the people, just like the dictionary definition right there says. So basically, the government national guard, police, and military don't qualify as 'militias' according to the definitions presented above. The Second Amendment thus applies to private citizens, not to government-controlled fighting forces. I don't see a single definition present for 'militia' that would lead one to the conclusion that the word refers to a governmental fighting force. I see many indications that it quite simply refers to ordinary citizens.
The ACLU claims to neutral on guns, and claims to not take a position on this issue.
http://www.ccrkba.org/pub/rkba/general/ACLU.htm
But the fact is, the ACLU is NOT neutral. The argument that the 2nd Amendment is a collective right rather than an individual right is the argument of those who fight against groups like the NRA or GOA and other groups that support this right. By claiming the ACLU is neutral and that you view the 2nd Amendment as a collective right, rather than an individual right, you are not being neutral, you are being anti-2nd Amendment. If this weren't bad enough, you tend to endorse candidates who are also anti-2nd amendment as well.
This is not the only example of what I consider to be bias on the part of the ACLU. There are plenty of other amendments in the Constitution that I don't think you do a good job of supporting. What about the 10th amendment? There are a lot of Federal programs that would seem to violate the 10th amendment, yet I don't see the ACLU lifting a finger about it. Could it be that this is possibly because the constituency of the ACLU and that many of its members are left-wing democrats who support big-government, and omit sections of the constitution they aren't comfortable with, while putting liberal judges on the courts who will disregard rights that are clearly in the constitution while promoting those that are not even present?
You can't pick and choose from the Constitution. If you are going to point to the fourth amendment and say you have a right to privacy because it is the law of the land (the constitution), then that means in order to be consistent and not be hypocritical, you must also recognize the rest of the rights enshrined in the same document for the rest of the people.
How can the ACLU, as an organization that is supposedly out to defend the constitution, completely disregard and ignore the sections of the Constitution or Bill of Rights they find inconvenient, while using the sections they do find convenient to their advantage? The ACLU is more about promoting the democratic party than actually defending the constitutional rights of Americans.
Even if the right to keep and bear arms was not constitutionally guaranteed in the Second Amendment (I personally believe it IS), the ninth amendment also states that the rights of the people are not limmited to those expressed in the Bill of Rights.
Another thing to consider is that even if the 2nd Amendment doesn't protect the right to bear arms, and even if the 9th amendment doesn't, the 10th Amendment still should restrict the FEDERAL government's ability to legislate their gun policies onto the states and onto the private citizens of those states.
Some would argue that the interstate commerce clause would allow the Federal government to regulate this, but the word 'interstate' refers to commerce occurring on or crossing state lines, not commerce WITHIN the states. So if a person manufactures his own firearm, or purchases one from a local seller who is not anywhere near state lines, why would the ACLU not defend their rights?