The Uninvited Ombudsman Report, No. 66 - National Parks... Again

Taken from the most recent "Page Nine", Alan Korwin's "The Uninvited Ombudsman Report"

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2- National Parks... Again

The lamestream media told you:

The powerful gun lobby attached an amendment to the must-pass credit-card-reform act Mr. Obama had decided to enact without delay. This forced him to approve a gun law he would probably otherwise not, when he signed it into law on May 22.

The last-minute late-night passage of a rule change by the Bush Administration had lifted the long-standing ban on dangerous guns in National Parks, but that was thankfully blocked by a lawsuit arguing the rule change failed to conduct a necessary environmental-impact study. The new law makes the lawsuit moot, and allows people to carry deadly loaded weapons into National Parks and Wildlife Refuges, where people go for peaceful recreation and nature watching.

The Uninvited Ombudsman notes however that:

Routine constitutional firearms carry in National Parks and Refuges remained uninfringed until the 1980s, when it was banned as a way to prevent hunters from hunting in forbidden zones. Because catching poachers was difficult, the much easier route of banning any possession was adopted through "regulations," by agencies incapable of enforcing their laws. No apparent authority to ban the Second Amendment in National Parks exists, but no arrests of the improper authorities have been made.

The ban was lifted by president Bush II, but only for people with government-issued carry permits, excluding 98% of the public. This was hailed as a great achievement, mainly by the 2% of people who were photographed, fingerprinted, entered in criminal databases, paid the tax, took the tests, went through the background screening, and got their expiration dates on state-issued ID papers (now made of plastic from foreign oil).

Bush's lifting of the ban (1/9/09) was rapidly overturned however (3/19/09), by a lawsuit with support from a compliant judge, arguing that concealed carry might have an impact on the environment. This conjecture, though preposterous on its face, was no less honored by the judge.

While the appeal worked its way through the courts (and rights remained denied), Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., introduced an amendment (Sec. 512) to an unrelated credit-card bill (HR 627), to restore the right to keep and bear arms for all law-abiding Americans in National Parks and Wildlife Refuges, not just government-permit holders. It passed 67-29 in the Senate, and 279-147 in the House.

The bill's "findings" section states, after summarizing the shenanigans denying peoples' rights, that "(7) Congress needs to weigh in on the new regulations to ensure that unelected bureaucrats and judges cannot again override the Second Amendment rights of law-abiding citizens..." and that "(8) The Federal laws should make it clear that the second amendment rights of an individual at a unit of the National Park System or the National Wildlife Refuge System should not be infringed."

The bill, signed 5/22/09, takes effect in nine months (2/22/10), leaving the public rightless until then. That's assuming of course no further intervention is made by anti-rights forces who seek to ban the Second Amendment wherever possible. The new law simply states that anyone not banned from possessing a firearm can carry in the parks and refuges under the state laws where the facility is located.

In other news, the president and Congress, in enacting the RKBA reform, have set rules for the operation of the credit card industry, with no explicit constitutional authority to do so. No charges (criminal charges, not financial charges) have been made against them. A superficial review of some of the rules seems they have value, but just because something may have value doesn't mean Congress has delegated authority to act.

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8- Sotomayor Gets Nod

The lamestream media told you:

The Washington Post reported on page one that Obama, while nearing his selection for a new Supreme Court nominee, was "conferring with a circle of advisers but is heavily involved in his own review as a lawyer who loves constitutional law."

The Uninvited Ombudsman notes however that:

Whatever the Post meant with its aggrandizing editorial phrase, "a lawyer who loves constitutional law," the word "Constitution" did not appear in any of Mr. Obama's reported remarks while selecting a Supreme Court Justice to fill an open seat.

The president's quoted adjectives describing his preferences include: common touch, practical sense, empathy, feeling, stand in somebody else's shoes, see through their eyes, practical day-to-day living, practical matter, how regulations might effect the business in a practical way, intellectual firepower, and not just ivory tower learning. http://tinyurl.com/qfh9mb

After selecting the most left-leaning candidate on his short list, he added the candidate should have, "an understanding of how the world works," "How ordinary people live," should bring "experience tested by obstacles and barriers," as well as by "hardship and misfortune," and especially, "experience insisting, persisting, and ultimately overcoming those barriers." This amounts to "necessary ingredients in the kind of Justice we need."

Previously, Supreme Court nominations involved terms such as qualifications, history, track record, precedent, stare decisis, original intent, original meaning, originalism, scholarship, textual analysis, Founding Fathers, drafters, framers and rule of law.

"Love of constitutional law" also seems unlikely to describe Mr. Obama's legislative proposals, which include one bill after another with little if any apparent grounding in the Constitution. That document provides no authority, for example, to take over the practice of medicine, or for taking tax money from the public and giving it away to companies that are poorly run or on the verge of bankruptcy.

Deemed "bailouts" by the administration and their staunch allies in the press, these have turned out to be "buyouts," with the government exercising increasing socialist controls over entire sectors of the U.S. economy, hurting Americans everywhere, also unthinkable under the Constitution Mr. Obama reportedly loves.
Perhaps the truth is buried in a song lyric, "You only hurt the ones you love."

Enacted under a threat of financial doom, only 2.4% of the buyout money ($19B out of $787B) has actually been spent now three months after passage. This has caused some observers not in the press to question the dire warnings that forbade reading or understanding the bills' contents, effects or need before signing. "The world was going to collapse into chaos if we didn't immediately enact the buyout," one observer with a memory recalls. "Now, the president is just sitting on the biggest slush fund the world has even seen. When will he actually spend it, and on what? No one knows."

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Contents:
(searchable by item number)
1- Muslims Soliciting Obama
2- National Parks... Again
3- Drug Cartels Promoted
4- Hollywood Hypocrisy Hyped
5- Criminal Smoker Glorified
6- Pimping Your Ride
7- Swallowing Industries Whole
8- Sotomayor Gets Nod
9- Obama Fried Chicken

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Thanks for reading!
Alan Korwin
The Uninvited Ombudsman