Patriot Act Up for Renewal

The Patriot Act should have never been created to begin with.

It was made while we were all still very emotional, many of us, including myself though have hated it from the start.  It appears that the congress is going to be adding another year onto the Patriot Act.

This would extend it until February of 2012, and passage is likely to happen with little debate or contention.

Remember who the DHS considers terrorists.  Time to write your congress critters.  This renewal needs to be at least debated, preferably fully derailed.

1st Amendment Threatened…

In lieu of the event that occurred in Arizona on Saturday, January 8th, Rep. Robert Brady wants to introduce legislation to “protect” congress.

Rep. Robert Brady (D-Pa.) reportedly plans to introduce legislation that would make it a federal crime to use language or symbols that could be perceived as threatening or inciting violence against a federal official or member of Congress.

Watch the video, you will notice that, just like any other politician, he avoids answering the questions directed to him.

He is one of the many dancing in the blood of the victims who died and were injured.

TMM would have added this to his post had he been able to find the link.

H/T to JayG

Let No Good Crisis Go Wasted

It took no time at all for the left and right to start dancing in the blood of those that died in the tragic events of yesterday.  Now that the initial blood dance is over, our fearless leaders are already figuring out how to get the most mileage from this tragedy.

“My staff is working on looking at the different legislation fixes that we might be able to do and we might be able to introduce as early as tomorrow,” McCarthy told POLITICO in a Sunday afternoon phone interview.

This is the same woman who informed all of us in the gun community a barrel shroud “is the shoulder thing that goes up”.

It is despicable to take an even such as this and use it to your own political gains.  Even more despicable when your political agenda is the destruction of a specifically enumerated right.  This whole mess gets even better though.  Because while Ms. McCarthy attacks the Second Amendment, the Pima County Sheriff is attacking the First Amendment.

“I think the vitriolic rhetoric that we hear day in and day out from people in the radio business and some people in the TV business and what (we) see on TV and how our youngsters are being raised, that this has not become the nice United States of America that most of us grew up in. And I think it’s time that we do the soul-searching,” the sheriff said.

Translation: If you are not broadcasting something that does not tote the party line, causes one to question what they have been told, or questions the authority of the government, it is counter to the public good and should be censored. 

Both of these responses two the shooting are by no means surprising, especially Ms. McCarthy’s considering she danced in the blood on the day of the Virginia Tech Shootings.  On the contrary it was immediately what I expected when I first heard about the shooting.  Not only is it not surprising they have one strong corollary shared between the two, which goes to show their goals are not what they claim.  The Sherriff and Ms. McCarthy both blame various tools completely ignoring the responsibility of the individual himself.  As Rob Allen showed earlier today though, the choice of tools is actually irrelevantThe greatest weapon in the world is the human brain, for that is what actually does damage, without it a weapon will remain motionless and inactive.