Very few public policy controversies have been characterized by emotional arguments, anecdotal evidence and outright ignorance quite like the debate over gun control. Those advocating for tight restrictions on gun ownership must play on the emotions of their audience because the facts and the Constitution are simply not on their side. At the heart of this debate are fundamental questions about the role of government in our “free” society.

The basic question is this: Who should be trusted, the people or the government? If the people are to be trusted, the right of the people to arm themselves should not be abridged. If the government is to be trusted, the power of the government to restrict the arming of the people should not be denied. The framers of our Constitution understood this question. They had experience with tyrannical government. The iron fist of King George III had driven them to seek independence from the crown and, at the risk of their lives, to form a new republic. Their goal was to create a country governed by laws that would never allow heavy-handed government rule. They understood that a citizenry with access to guns is necessary. Guns in the hands of private citizens are the last line of defense against both foreign invasion and tyrannical government. If the citizens in the days of the Revolution did not have guns, America might still be a British colony. I believe the founding fathers would be aghast at the tactics which gun control advocates employ to do away with individual liberty in this area, attempting instead to put control in the hands of government. The number of myths put forth by gun control advocates is truly astonishing. Here are a few of those.

The first myth, and the one used most often, is that should more government restriction be imposed on gun ownership, fewer crimes would occur. To best understand the situation, the citizens of this country can be divided into three basic groups: those who make the laws, those who keep the laws and those who break the laws. The argument of gun control advocates is that those who break the law, namely those who commit violent acts with the assistance of a gun, would not break the law if the lawmakers, namely the government, further restricted guns. They believe that simply because guns are restricted, law breaking individuals would cease their violence. Any logical person should be able to see the critical flaw in their thinking. This argument, in essence, supposes that the violent nature of criminals is dependent on the availability of the instruments used to carry out their violence. Frankly, I find this assumption absurd. To believe this is to believe that lawbreakers derive their criminal tendencies from a set of government regulations, or the lack thereof. To believe this is to ignore the fact that lawbreakers will find ways to get weapons to act out their criminal desires whether or not the government restricts them. Abusable drugs are illegal, and yet large quantities of these substances can be found on nearly every street corner. To put it simply, lawbreakers break laws. The very fact that they want to commit crimes demonstrates that they have no respect for the law. It is ludicrous to expect that a criminal who wants to break the law and murder will be deterred because there are laws to restrict guns. If a criminal is deranged enough to break the laws against murder, why on earth would anyone assume he would have respect for laws against guns?

Making guns illegal would not take guns out of the hands of those who break the laws, it would take them out of the hands of those who keep the laws. Law abiding citizens would have no means of defense against law breaking citizens. As Thomas Jefferson wisely put it, “[Gun control laws] disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes...Such laws make things worse for the assaulted and better for the assailants; they serve rather to encourage than to prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than an armed man.” The statistics support his assertion. A recent study showed that if a robbery victim does not defend himself with a gun, the robbery will succeed 88 percent of the time, and the victim will be injured 25 percent of the time. However, if the victim defends himself with a gun, the success rate of the robbery falls to 30 percent, and the injury rate to 17 percent.

The other popular myth advanced by gun control advocates is that the Constitution does not imply that every citizen has a right to bear arms, but only law enforcement and the military. The text of the Second Amendment reads, “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.” The argument of gun control advocates is that the “militia” mentioned in the text does not consist of ordinary citizens, but of government-sanctioned organizations like the military. But this is simply not the case. The term “militia” would have been understood to mean any citizen capable of defending himself or herself. The Supreme Court affirmed this in its most recent case on the subject, United States v. Morton, which stipulated that the only requirement for being considered part of the “militia” was to be able to act “in concert for the common defense.”

The Constitution is a document that legitimizes an entire form of government in a few pages. As such, it uses generally broad language, and does not often go into the minute details about the rights of citizens. The fact that the gun is the only piece of personal property guaranteed not to be regulated in our Constitution speaks volumes about the founders desire to place the responsibility of gun ownership in the hands of the citizens. Gun laws will not deter criminals, and the restriction of guns by the government is fundamentally unconstitutional. If we ignore these simple facts, we not only endanger our citizens, but we trample upon the founding documents and the legacy our founding fathers fought and died to pass on to posterity.

Josh

We are tired of the taxes. We are tired of the out of control spending. We are tired of the dishonesty. We are tired of having a government that is totally self consumed. We are tired of our Congress mortgaging away our children's futures. We are tired of the continual loss of freedom. We are tired of the disregard for the Constitution. We want to send Washington a message that we want real change, change from an increasingly nationalist government back to the type of government our founders gave their lives to create. Here is the open letter we wrote to President Obama expressing these concerns.

Before every member of Congress begins his term of service he is made to take an oath before the people. The very first promise in that oath is to “support and defend the Constitution of the United States.” It would be logical to assume, therefore, that every member of Congress aspires to study the Constitution and to make laws in strict accordance with it. However, in recent decades, the Constitution has been so neglected and misunderstood that it plays little or no role in the decision making process of these, our elected officials. Sadly the same can be said of most American citizens. Under what power enumerated in the Constitution can Congress, for example, bail out failing private corporations? Under what power can it regulate a business to control its “carbon output?” Under what power can it establish a nationalized health care system? Under what power can it mandate a nationalized education program? To determine whether Congress has these powers, we must turn to the text of the Constitution itself, as well as the other writings of our country’s founders to further elucidate their original intent.

What authority can the Congress claim legitimately under our Constitution? Article 1 Section 8 makes abundantly clear the powers of Congress. These 19 enumerated powers include the coining of currency, the regulation of naturalization processes, the declaration of war, and the maintenance of armed forces. Nowhere among these 19 powers is the power to levy income taxes, to regulate business, to subsidize farms, or to nationalize banks. The one power that has been most misconstrued in order to justify these acts in the collective mind of Congress is what is known as the “general welfare clause.” This passage reads,

“The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States.”

These two words, “general welfare,” have been cited as the rationale for vast amounts of government action. Upholding the Constitution means, however, seeking not only a perfunctory comprehension of these words, but a more profound understanding of the intentions behind their inclusion in this founding document.

First, as New Jersey Supreme Court Justice and author Andrew Napolitano writes in his book Constitution in Exile, “The term "general welfare" is understood to be a qualification on the power of Congress to tax, not a separate grant of power.” In other words, Congress cannot do anything it wants under the general welfare clause, but it may tax and spend under the clause, and then only when that taxing and spending is in line with the other enumerated powers in the Constitution.

That assessment can be made based not only upon the text itself but upon other writings of those who wrote the Constitution. The founders of our republic were not uniform in their desire for limited government. There were those at the Constitutional Convention who wanted to give supreme power to the central government, and there were others who desired to limit that power. In the pursuit of a balanced opinion, will look at the writings of people on both sides of the political spectrum.

Thomas Jefferson was a proponent of a limited federal government. He would have sided with those at the convention who wanted more states rights and less federal interference. It would be rational to assume that he had an understanding of the general welfare clause that would have precluded using that clause as justification for widespread federal government activity. He wrote these words, in explanation of the clause,

"Our tenet ever was... that Congress had not unlimited powers to provide for the general welfare, but were restrained to those specifically enumerated, and that, as it was never meant that they should provide for that welfare but by the exercise of the enumerated powers, so it could not have been meant they should raise money for purposes which the enumeration did not place under their action; consequently, that the specification of powers is a limitation of the purposes for which they may raise money."

In short, there would be no reason to include 19 enumerated powers if one of those powers gave unlimited power. The things that the government can do for the general welfare are limited to those that they can do under another enumerated power.

On the other side of the political spectrum from Jefferson was the band of nationalists, led by Hamilton, Jay and Madison. These favored a strong central government, and giving more powers and duties to this government. For this reason, Madison makes a strong case for a limited understanding of the general welfare clause when he says,

"For what purpose could the enumeration of particular powers be inserted if these and all others were meant to be included in the preceding general power? Nothing is more natural nor common than first to use a general phrase, and then to explain and qualify it by a recital of particulars."

A limited interpretation of the general welfare clause is not only posited by the anti-consolidationists. As Madison’s comments demonstrate, Constitutional authors on both sides of the political spectrum agreed upon one understanding of this clause when it was authored. Therefore, we can say with confidence that those who use the general welfare clause to legitimize all kinds of government action are wrong. It is not, and never was intended to be, subject to interpretation.

If the government does not have authority to do something, who does? Amendment 10 makes that completely clear.

“The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”

The states have authority to deal with issues that are not in the realm of authority of the federal government. As we have shown, much of what the federal government does today is literally unconstitutional. What can the average citizen do to combat this? We must make a commitment to educate ourselves and learn which elected officials support unconstitutional legislation. The genius of our form of government is that we are primarily ruled by laws, but there are also democratic elements by which the people can remove from authority those in power who break or subvert those laws. We have a huge responsibility. We the people are the only ones who have the power to remove law-breaking politicians. The only way this form of government will work is if we actually study the actions of our elected officials, and vote them out of office when they fail to respect and govern by the Constitution. A good resource for the evaluation of our elected officials can be found at Project Vote Smart. Also, this article by Constitutional expert Joe Sobran is one of the best we have found on the subject. We encourage you again, do not sit idle while our politicians chip away at our Constitution, the very foundation of our republic. We alone have the power and the responsibility to remove them from office.

Josh

President Obama entered the White House with a dangerous belief. He took his seat in the Oval Office thinking he had a mandate from the American people. He apparently believes that because John McCain was defeated handily, the country wants change of a socialistic nature. President Obama and his associates believe that the voters’ repudiation of politicians like George Bush and John McCain show that conservatism as a whole is no longer of interest to the American people. This is an illusion, because it was not small government core conservative principles that the American public voted out. Conservative principles were not even on the ballot. It was the blue-blood Republican moderatism that characterized the policy advocated by Bush and McCain that was rejected. This illusion in the mind of the new administration is incredibly dangerous because they are acting as if the public is open to leftward political movement on a grand scale. The administration has already begun to push incredibly large spending bills on the public, and it has said it plans to do even more.

There are three main ways for the government to acquire more spending money: debt, taxation, and printing money. For Obama to accomplish his massive spending goals, he will have to do all three, which will have decisively negative effects on our already weak economy. The administration has already employed one of these three methods.

Within the first week of his presidency, the administration has pushed for a massive “stimulus package,” ostensibly aimed at giving a boost to our faltering economy. This piece of legislation (all 600+ pages of it) is a bloated, pork-filled, Keynesian disgrace of a bill. Moreover, it could be argued that much of this legislation is actually unconstitutional. Honor is due to the House Republicans, and 11 House Democrats, who rallied together in opposition to this bill. House Minority Leader John Boehner posted this revealing look at the bill on his website. Rep. Boehner really did some good work on this bill, particularly in pulling together every House Republican in opposition to it. Here are some interesting excerpts from his piece:

• The $825 billion package will exceed more than $1.1 trillion when adding in the interest ($300 plus billion) between 2009-2019 to pay for it.
• All members of the “Accountability and Transparency Board” created by this legislation are appointees of the President; none will be appointed by Congress.
• $825 billion is just the beginning – many Capitol Hill Democrats want to spend even more taxpayer dollars on their “stimulus” plan. In fact, the Chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, Rep. David Obey (D-WI), told Roll Call earlier this month, “I would not be surprised to see us go further on some of these programs down the line.”
• The House Democrats’ bill will cost each and every household $6,700 in additional debt, paid for by our children and grandchildren.

This bill can only be defined as Keynesian in nature, because the authors feel that injecting federal government money into the economy through spending programs and temporary tax refunds will increase economic activity in the long term. These are the same Keynesian tactics used by the Bush administration that did little more than put our country in greater debt. For a great explanation of Keynesian economics, watch this video from the Cato Institute’s Dan Mitchell.

These are the economic principles that the Obama administration have repeatedly endorsed, and by which they will inevitably rule for the next four years. The belief that government spending can cure failing economies has been a bedrock principle of the new President from the beginning. In a recent interview with Reuters, Obama said, "The consensus is this, that we have to do whatever it takes to get this economy moving again, that we have to -- we're going to have to spend money now to stimulate the economy." Obama went on to say, "And (consensus is) that we shouldn't worry about the deficit next year or even the year after; that short term, the most important thing is that we avoid a deepening recession." This is a revealing look at the underlying economic principles Obama holds. This kind of freewheeling spending ideology is exactly what prolonged the Great Depression, and has led to our astronomical national debt. As mentioned in a previous article, any nation whose national debt is greater than 60% of its GDP is considered a very risky investment in international banking circles. As this chart indicates, America’s debt could surely put it into that category already.

The use of the word “consensus” is evidence that he believes, as I mentioned earlier, that he has been given carte blanche from the people to enact this kind of socialistic legislation. Mr. Obama, it would appear, needs to be informed of one simple fact: there is no consensus. There has been a huge groundswell of opposition to this “stimulus” bill. However, he and the Democrats in Congress will march on with this type of legislation, however “non-partisan” they claim to be.

In addition to debt, the administration will need to raise taxes and print more money to function under this mindset of government spending as the cure for a struggling economy. We’ve already laid out how tax increases hurt the economy. Senator Richard Burr (R-NC) in an article for Human Events states that “Obama’s promise to raise taxes just on the Democrats’ ‘attractive target’ of people earning over $250,000, will only generate $225 billion over 5 years, far short of the $1.4 trillion which Obama’s proposed programs (actually only 60% of them) would saddle taxpayers with during that same time frame.” When looking at the numbers, one can see that the implementation of the administration’s spending goals will have to come with significant and widespread tax increases.

Also, though Obama himself does not like to mention it, if his administration follows the lead of those in the past, which is quite likely, he will have to resort to printing money to pay for his spending. Our currency has recently been devalued, mainly because of too much currency in the system. What usually follows an inflationary boom, where there is increased asset prices and cheap money, is a deflationary bust, where currency is devalued, prices fall, and money supply contracts as loans go bad. However, since our currency is not backed by anything, prices are not going to fall, but the currency will fail. As leading economic analyst Peter Schaff says, “What happens is, when you get the deflationary bust the government doesn’t let it happen. The government interferes with the market attempts to bring down real estate prices, to bankrupt companies – the government doesn’t want that happening. So what do they do to fend it off? They print money. They print money. They keep the spending going, they keep the money flowing, and what happens is the currency collapses and prices go through the roof.” The administration has not had time to do this yet, but if history is any teacher, and if we know anything about Obama’s economic plans, it will.

Friends, it has become clear that the new President will not act in the country’s best interest, and that he has a Congress willing to shut down debate about these issues. Again, I urge you to take action. Research the bills before Congress, call or email your “representatives,” and let your voice be heard. Now more than ever, the responsibility of creating a better nation for our children rests not in the government, but in ourselves.

Josh and Evan

Our world is in the midst of a global propaganda effort. The climate change issue is in reality, large-scale effort on the part of government and government-lovers to deliberately create a sense of panic over something as natural as the change of the seasons, or the sunrise. We as citizens are being told by those in the media and in public office, “You have no reason, and no right to question us on this issue.” We are being told that the final verdict is in, that there is universal consensus, that every scientist on the planet is in agreement that the earth is burning up as a result of human activity. As Americans, we sometimes take our freedoms for granted, and thus we fail to exercise them. We must, on this issue and every issue, question the vocal majority. No one should consider himself free-willed if he accepts as fact those ideas fed to him through the news media, Washington, and Hollywood. Was the majority correct when they said the earth was not spherical? Was Galileo wrong to question the authorities, even at the expense of his freedom? Everyone who accepts the propaganda being handed to them on this issue must question whether he or she is truly a freethinking individual. We each have a chance to emulate Galileo and other uncompromising thinkers. We have no desire to tell you what to think, but to merely encourage you to think. We will urge you, unlike those on the opposing side, to research everything we say, to verify its accuracy. That is the difference between us and those who preach the global warming orthodoxy. The following is an exploration of facts, which will hopefully lead you to question what you hear, and truly think about this issue.

In order to determine the validity of the argument that global climate change is caused by man, we first must examine the argument itself. For our purposes here, we will refer to those on this side of the issue as the “global warming alarmists.” Perhaps the most defining treatment of this argument was made by former Vice President Al Gore in his documentary, An Inconvenient Truth. This film, with its foreboding soundtrack and frightening image sequences, was clearly meant to stir emotion in the audience, and it certainly does just that. This type of emotional argument is the core of the alarmist strategy. When the facts do not necessarily coincide with their point of view, they resort to playing upon the public’s emotions. In the midst of all this fear mongering, Mr. Gore puts forward some interesting statistics and claims. One of the most intriguing and superficially convincing graphs he uses shows the change in global temperature and its correlation with global CO2 levels.



The assumption that Gore makes is that CO2, which is a byproduct of some human activity, causes the temperature to rise. However, the ice core record does not support his assumption. As this must-read article from New Scientist explains,

“Ice cores from Antarctica show that at the end of recent ice ages, the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere usually started to rise only after temperatures had begun to climb.”

So as much as Gore wants to portray man as the instigator of climate change, the ice records tell a different story. As geologist and paleoclimate expert Dr. Bob Carter states, to say that CO2 is the primary cause of temperature change is like saying that lung cancer causes smoking. Climatologist Tim Ball, who earned a Ph.D. in climatology from the University of London says, “We now know for certain that the temperature changes before the CO2. One of the fundamental assumptions that Gore doesn’t understand is that in the theory of global warming due to humans, when the CO2 goes up the temperature goes up. The ice core record shows it’s exactly the opposite.” How can Dr. Ball be so certain? He can be certain because he has geologically verifiable evidence to support him. The ice core record does not lie, whereas former politicians eager to acquire fame and fortune by making a documentary just might.

Another claim Gore and many other global warming alarmists make is that there is generally universal scientific consensus in this area. Here is an actual quote made by Gore in the film,

“There’s not a single fact or date or number that’s been used to make this up that’s in any controversy. Isn’t there a disagreement among scientists about whether the problem is real or not? Actually, not really.”

These statements are unprecedented in their fallacy and intellectual irresponsibility. Gore is actually trying to get people to believe that this question is beyond debate, the argument beyond reproach and the issue above controversy. He is attempting to shut off the thought process in his audience by claiming there are no real scientists who disagree. However, there is a petition, signed by over 31,000 scientists rejecting the theory of man-made global warming. Read the petition and the research here. A less exhaustive list of dissenting scientists exists here. Gore’s claim of scientific consensus is not only untrue but highly inappropriate. The difference between Mr. Gore and our side is that we hope you will examine our claims for validity and he hopes you do not examine his. He hopes that by saying he uses no disputable facts, you will simply not dispute his facts. We encourage you to dispute ours, if you can.

There are many more claims Gore makes in his film that do not stand up to reason or truth. He claims that climate change will cause the polar ice caps to melt, drastically increasing sea levels. He claims that this rise of ocean levels will cause much of Florida to go underwater. The following image from the film is one of the more memorable ones.



Mr. Gore claims that polar ice melting will increase sea levels by 20 feet. This statement is truly baffling because this figure is nowhere near any other estimates. The UN’s International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) issued a report which states that the upper limit of sea level rise by the year 2300 would be 23 inches. There are many scientists that even dispute this fact, but even if it were true, Al Gore’s estimate over that same period of time is unbelievably different. Chris Horner of the Competitive Enterprise Institute and author of the book Red Hot Lies says, “Al Gore makes up 20 feet. The truth isn’t scary.”

The tactics used by Gore and the other alarmists are based upon emotions. When the truth isn’t scary, make up hypotheticals. When you want to shut down debate, claim there is no reason to debate. When the facts don’t support your argument, ignore them. But what are the facts? Is the globe getting warmer? If so, then why?

It seems impossible to argue with the statement that the globe has gotten warmer. There are proven ways to measure temperature change. However, the reasons for this change can be shown to be natural, and not a result of human activity. For all of earth’s recorded history, there have been changes in the mean temperature, some much more dramatic than the current cycle of warming. The following graph illustrates some of these changes.



If we take a closer look at some of the earth’s warm periods, we find that our earth has endured much hotter temperatures, and for much longer than we are experiencing presently. In the hundred years leading up to 2005, earth’s mean surface temperature rose approximately 0.74 °C. During the time period known as the Holocene Thermal Maximum the temperature rose as much as 4 °C near the north pole, a rise far greater than the 0.74 °C seen recently. Did polar bears go extinct? No. Was half the world under water? No. According to the ice core records, the Holocene Maximum lasted for nearly three millennia, as shown in this figure, and still, the earth recovered.



Having established the fact that the earth’s temperature does change, we should establish a reason for the change. Global warming alarmists would like you to believe that one greenhouse gas of many, CO2, a product of some human activity, is the cause for a global change in temperature. Did human CO2 cause the Holocene Maximum? Of course not. The CO2 producing technology on which climate change has been blamed has only existed for several decades. Clearly, there must be another natural driving factor affecting climate change. As commentator Glenn Beck writes in his book, An Inconvenient Book,

“Have you ever noticed that from the time you wake up in the morning to the middle of the day, the globe seems to warm? Have you also noticed how that warming seems to correspond with that giant ball of light in the sky? It’s so weird!”

Indeed, there is much evidence suggesting a much closer correlation between solar activity and climate change than between CO2 and climate change. Two respected climate scientists released a report documenting this correlation. Read the report here. The graph below represents their findings.



The red line illustrates solar activity, and the blue line represents the earth’s average temperature. The data was collected by Dr. E. Friis-Christensen, Director of the Danish National Space Center, and Professor of geophysics and space physics at the Niels Bohr Institute of University of Copenhagen, and Dr. Knud Lassen, Head of the Solar-Terrestrial Physics Division, Danish Meteorological Institute, Copenhagen, Denmark.The graph shows that within the last 100 years, the earth’s average temperature has risen approximately 0.74 °C, and solar ultra-violet, visible and heat radiation has increased similarly. It is a much more logical assumption that the main source of heat in our solar system prompts changes in temperature in our solar system. As you can see in the chart, the change in solar activity precedes change in temperature. This is a much more logical cause-and-effect relationship than that between CO2 and temperature change.

Reasonable people should ask why. Why would so many people agressively promote a concept that is so intellectually flawed? The truth is that government-lovers everywhere see this as an unprecedented opportunity. It is an opportunity to push further regulation, restriction, and government interference upon the public. If human activity is causing climate change, the government’s logical solution would be to restrict human activity. If government can convince the public that people are at fault, the public would then be much more willing to surrender their freedoms than if they were simply taken away with no explanation. The fact of the matter is global warming has become a battle cry for government-loving leftists because through it they can control and manipulate the citizenry. That is why you are being bombarded with “what if” scenarios, portrayed incessantly in the media. They tell you to accept what they say as fact though their evidence is shaky at best, and outright false at worst. A great documentary on this is available here. We urge you, do not accept what Al Gore says just because you saw his film, and at the same time, do not accept what we say just because you read this article. Be a free-thinking individual. Freedom is the essence of America. That being said, we urge you to join the brave and growing minority in opposition to the global warming alarmism, and take your place among the great dissenters, from Galileo to Luther, from Thoreau to Dr. King.

Josh