Sit In, Settle Back, and Shut Up

Entertainment doesn’t come much richer than elderly politicians fattened on our taxes and their own self-importance creakily collapsing to the floor of the House of Representatives. Oh, the awkwardness and obvious discomfort! And yet, viva la 1960s! Only tie-dye and love beads are missing as these Congressional cretins vie once again to repeal the Second Amendment without the bother of actually doing so.

Supposedly, they’re literally “on the House floor with @repjohnlewis & Dems staging a sit-in to demand action on common-sense gun legislation,” as “Rep. John Yarmuth (@RepJohnYarmuth) June 22, 2016” put it in “social media’s” fractured syntax. I guess the Democrats discount such “action” as a fifteen-hour filibuster in the Senate, the four anti-Constitutional bills Their Senilities considered (and rejected) on Monday, and a fifth that’s pending. Would that we could get that much inaction on repealing Obummercare, the IRS, the TSA, Common Core, the NSA, etc., ad infinitum.

Expanding on Yarmuth’s faux grievance was “Oregon Rep. Suzanne Bonimici.” “’All we’re asking for today is the first step,’ she said. ‘No fly, no buy. Good grief, why can’t we get that passed? Why can’t we just bring that up for a vote, Mr. Speaker?’” Abducting Arnold Akers, Becky Best Price: $15.95 Buy New $19.95 (as of 10:35 UTC - Details)

Because, Suzy, that’s simply and clearly a publicity stunt, given that the Senate has already rejected it. (I wrote that sentence before seeing this quote from Speaker of the House, Paul Ryan: “’This is nothing more than a publicity stunt,’ Ryan told CNN. ‘This bill was already defeated in the United States Senate.’” Eeeewwww. God forbid I’m thinking the way a Rethuglican does.) Indeed, denying victims of the wildly inaccurate, arbitrary, and secretive “No Fly” lists their right to keep and bear is so grotesquely tyrannical that the bill has repeatedly failed since its introduction in 2007. Meanwhile, protocol in the House of Representatives prevents “media on the scene” from “broadcast[ing the sit-in] … because the House is technically in recess. Media organizations including C-SPAN are not able to broadcast … because the House was not gaveled into session.”

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No matter: the wannabe hippies are live streaming. Such “transmissions” still “technically breach the rules of the House of Representatives, but one Democrat congressman, Scott Peters, who provided a feed via the Periscope app, said the sit-in was breaking rules anyway.” Yeah, since when do Progressives frown on lawlessness? The more of it, the better, in fact.

Which is just so typical. These spoiled brats lost fair and square—or as fair and square as unfair, corrupt government ever is—so now they throw a tantrum to get their way. The only surprise is that Republicans found their long-lost cojones this time and, “in the early hours of Thursday morning, … adjourn[ed] for a recess that will last through July 5 … swiftly closing the legislative session in the middle of the night …”

Ergo, “shortly after 7:00 a.m.,” only “20 Democrats remained … , including House Minority leader Nancy Pelosi … without cameras, lights or a legislative session.” Whoa! Pretend you’re one of those twenty elected narcissists, camping out on the carpet: how long will you last without cameras but with Nancy Pelosi? So dismal a fate should convince even these despots that disarming us ain’t worth it—especially given Nancy’s trademark battiness: “Just because [Republicans] cut and run in the dark of night, just because they have left doesn’t mean we have to take no for an answer.” Of course not, you moron. Go ahead and sit there until July 5: that way, you’re impotent and useless instead of treasonous and lethal. (But still predatory: “the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee used the opportunity to fundraise, with Pelosi telling supporters, ‘I need 6,000 gifts in the door during tonight’s sit-in. Will you pitch in $1?’”) Halestorm Akers, Becky Buy New $8.57 (as of 10:30 UTC - Details)

Alas, Nancy has no monopoly on stupidity, and the sit-in’s idleness has afforded her fellows ample chance to strut their own. From “Gwen Moore (@RepGwenMoore)” comes this distastefully boastful bit of melodrama: “I’ve been arrested for protesting genocide in Darfur & standing w/ @fightfor15. Prepared to do the same to #EndGunViolence.”

Then there’s John Lewis, an antique leftover from the Civil Wrongs—sorry, Rights era.This “icon’s” alleged “leadership” of the sit-in inspires the mainstream media to admiringly compare his current push for voiding the Second Amendment with his earlier success at voiding our freedom of association under the First—“one of the epochal events in American history,” as CNN’s unbiased and objective reporting has it. Yep, this is the same media that goes apoplectic whenever Rethuglicans shut down the government.

At any rate, Lewis and a sidekick named Katherine Clark justify their sit-in with claims that they have discerned an entirely new “fundamental responsibility” for Congress: “to protect American families from harm.” Hmmm. I’d like to see a Constitutional citation for that since Article I, Section 8 doesn’t list anything even remotely similar among its eighteen paragraphs. Likewise, though “California Rep. Ami Bera” urged “from the House floor…,” “Mr. Speaker, let’s do the right thing … Let’s prevent that next tragedy. Let’s save that next life,” Article I says nothing about preventing tragedies or saving lives. Recall that these demagogues swore an oath to uphold the Constitution, including the Second Amendment, rather than to “do the right thing.” Doesn’t that make every last stinking one of them guilty of perjury at the very least?

But perhaps Lewis and Clark are as confused about the Constitution as they are about their own activities: they claim that they are “refus[ing] to sit by while this Congress abdicates its fundamental responsibility to protect American families from harm” when sitting is precisely what they’re doing. Indeed, John regularly gabbles gibberish: “’We’re going to continue to sit in and sit down,’ he said Wednesday night. ‘By sitting in and sitting down, we’re standing up.’” Huh?

But John leaves us with a heartening promise: “…when we come back in July, we start it all over again…” I certainly hope so. Unless he and his motley fools paralyze Congress again in July, our lives, liberty, and property will be in their usual danger.