Red Flag Laws
Tigers have an incredible hunting instinct of lurking in the shadows for hours, even days, biding their time for just the right opportunity to attack their prey. It’s part of their DNA and inherent to who they are as one of the most ferocious animals on the face of the earth. Often times, they will wait for the exact moment when a situation or event occurs that helps isolate their intended target. They also have the uncanny ability to blend in with the environment around them, not allowing others to be able to detect them for what they really represent, a danger. A disabled or hurt gazelle, a baby antelope gone astray, and even an elder statesman of the zebra herd not quite able to keep up with the rest, leaves them vulnerable to attack. A cruel death is imminent in all but the most unusual cases. Simply put, tigers instinctively know how to take advantage of the situation and ultimately capture and destroy their prey. They are master opportunists!
In recent “Red Flag” discussion and potential legislation being floated by “left of center” professional political operatives, we’ve seen the same hunting instincts played out in the political domain before our very eyes. However, this time the prey is not of the animal variety, it is the potential for disastrous legislation that will attack our 2nd, 5th, and 14th amendment rights. Political opportunists have been lurking in the background for years waiting for just the right opportunity to pass unconstitutional legislation that is nothing more than a backdoor attempt to infringe upon our gun rights. They want to open the doors of “extreme risk protection laws” with broadly defined terms of adjudication that categorically takes power from “We the People” and hands it over to government and state interventionists. When has that ever worked in the history of the United States of America?
Our Founding Fathers expected much more from the body of the United States Senate. They expected our Senators to be a deliberative body and one that took the long and studied view of the issues in the aftermath of horrific and emotional events. When writing the Federalist Papers, Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, and James Madison knew that an “excited” minority should never rule the day in a moment of passion. In other words, they knew that our elected Senators should never make domestic strategic decisions when enveloped with emotion. Once again, political opportunists have exhibited the propensity to react to current events, take the political pulse of the day, and legislate as a professional political operative. We need politicians who will stand up and lead and are not reactionaries to current events.
The small number of states (eighteen states and the District of Columbia) that have passed Red Flag legislation have done nothing more than deprive lawful citizens of their rights to constitutional due process. Under Red Flag legislation, you are first guilty until you prove yourself innocent. In other words, the guns are taken until the courts vacate an extreme risk protection order. These laws fly in the face of our 5th and 14th amendment rights guaranteeing due process. Many of our Senators keep inching us closer to a European model of gun ownership where no European country has more than 30% of its citizens owning guns. The gun restrictions are endless. There is a reason why Europe relies on the military might of the U.S. to protect them. They have ceded control of the most fundamental form of protection…gun rights. They are unable to defend themselves.
Unfortunately, political opportunists haven’t proposed any type of legislation that strikes at the root of the mass shootings. They continue a strategy of managing the symptoms and results of the heinous acts while disregarding any and all of the causal relationships that exacerbate the potential for these shootings. The statistics are well documented that when people of all ages are involved as a family in faith-based and other community outreach programs, acts of gun violence correspondingly goes down. We need to have an open and honest discussion about the root causes in our society that support this evil. Only then will our country be able to strike at the heart of the matter and begin to rebuild her moral and spiritual center.
I support legislation that will strengthen the family unit, restore prayer in public schools, bring the Released Time programs from the shadows of obscurity to mainstream USA, restore the vital importance of quality mental health facilities in our nation, fight to overturn Roe v. Wade, build up the Opportunity Zones in America, and restore an educational system that believes in the goodness and distinctiveness of America and her moral and spiritual values.
Creating a vision for America that gives us hope for a brighter tomorrow will be the FORERUNNER of all our efforts to abate gun violence. Infringing on our gun rights is not the answer. We need true vision and leadership that sets America on a plain that is commensurate with her responsibility to the world and to our Creator.
~Amendment 2 – 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.
~Amendment 5 – No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a grand jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the militia, when in actual service in time of war or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.
~Amendment 14 - All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside. No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the law.