Tuesday, June 1, 2010

Martha Dean Unmasked

A great post by Meghan Freed at Connecticut Law Blog:




...Although running as a Republican, Martha Dean is almost a Libertarian. (Although I have no idea whether Dean would agree with my “Libertarian” connotation of the positions described on her website, the description is no less apt.) Dean’s version of Libertarianism shocks in two ways – first the “almost” and second the “Libertarian.” The “almost” involves Dean’s second pillar, “faith,” which we’ll return to later...

Here’s the thing about the type of Libertarianism inherent in Dean’s positions. It’s pretty darn batty. It’s pretty darn close to anarchic. Any political philosophy taken to its extreme is dangerous, but, as Rand Paul and his bring-back-the-segregated-lunch-counter-in-the-name-of- free-enterprise brand of wacky has taught us, Libertarianism tends to hang out much closer to the precipice than America’s brand of Liberalism, or even Conservatism. So now, please indulge some discussion of Martha Dean’s Libertarianism, beginning with the Second Amendment.

Agree or disagree, it is not surprising for a Republican candidate with Libertarian tendencies to support the rights of gun owners. Dean takes it a whole lot further, though. On her campaign site, Dean links to a video of her speaking at a second amendment march in Hartford on April 11th...

In this video Ms. Dean is standing in front of a banner for the Connecticut Citizens Defense League, Inc... Ms. Dean opens her speech by calling the Second Amendment “the greatest of all the amendments,” and she’s just warming up. At minute 3:40, she proclaims that as attorney general she will “oppose all efforts to create nonsensical distinctions that are nowhere supported by our constitutions between different types of firearms,” because “nowhere in the constitution does it say that the government gets the effective firearms and the people the ineffective ones,” and “nowhere in our constitution does it say that the government gets the modern firearms and the citizens only get the antiquated ones.”

....(A)n attorney general candidate opposing any restriction on any type of firearm is pretty outside the Connecticut mainstream. And it’s definitely outside the Supreme Court’s interpretation of the Constitution. (In District of Columbia v. Heller, 128 S. Ct. 2783, 2816-2817 (U.S. 2008), the Roberts Court noted that “Like most rights, the right secured by the Second Amendment is not unlimited. From Blackstone through the 19th-century cases, commentators and courts routinely explained that the right was not a right to keep and carry any weapon whatsoever in any manner whatsoever and for whatever purpose.” The Court stated that there is a historical tradition of prohibiting the carrying of “dangerous and unusual weapons,” and further noted that it would be permissible to ban “weapons that are most useful in military service – M-16 rifles and the like . . . .”)

In her speech Ms. Dean also advocates for in-school firearms training for boys and girls. So, you know, at least Junior will be safe with the family uzi.

...But the “faith” pillar of Dean’s platform triumvirate is when she swings off the Libertarian road. Dean “believes in a higher duty owed to God’s law when it conflicts with the laws of government...” Is Connecticut okay with an attorney general who would put her version of God’s law above Connecticut’s laws? Golly, I hope not. Apparently, Dean is so fond of the Second Amendment that she forgets about the First Amendment...

8 comments:

  1. >>In her speech Ms. Dean also advocates for in-school firearms training for boys and girls..

    I believe she's referring to the well known, and highly respected, The Eddie Eagle GunSafe® Program where the focus is on safety and doesn't include the actual presence of any firearms.

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  2. Nice essay, if you like hyperbole laden polemics - not that there's anything wrong with polemics! But you have to pick one - polemics or facts. To wit - "Rand Paul and his bring-back-the-segregated-lunch-counter-in-the-name-of- free-enterprise..." is not how I would characterize his views. Paul foolishly got caught up in a philosophical debate about property rights on teevee, which is not conducive to subtlety and nuance. I wish he had asked Rachel Maddow, "Does the black owner of an establishment have the right to refuse services to a klansman?"

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  3. >>"Does the black owner of an establishment have the right to refuse services to a klansman?"

    For all I care he should call in the ghost of John Brown and have `em whacked into pieces with an axe. That cures bigotry pretty well; instead of being bigoted slave owners Brown turned them into body parts.
    At least they weren't bigots anymore. (Plus, those individuals offered no resistance when we invaded the next year as we set out to free the slaves once and for all.)

    But I digress....

    The only thing we should absolutely refuse to tolerate is intolerance; most especially of a racial or ethnic sort.

    To second-guess God Himself (or if you prefer, Mother Nature) as it regards someone's skin tone, ethnicity, or how and where they see Deity or not is so over the line that the line is no longer visible.

    It's not a matter of "Can't we all get along?" it's simply a matter of giving others a wide enough berth and expecting the same in return.

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  4. >>Diversity is the Last Refuge of a Scoundrel

    I'd tend to agree with that more than not.

    English as the official language for example; and no more bi-lingual gov't forms etc.

    However; that doesn't preclude people from bringing some of their ancestral heritage with them to the U.S.

    Where would be for example had the Italians left all of their recipes at home?
    Instead of "Pizza & Beer" (many children are 9 or 10 before they learn those are 3 separate words) we'd be stuck with fast food chains like "Cedrics warm beer and Yorkshire Pudding on stick"

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  5. I love diversity, if we're talking about the real meaning of the word. I especially like the diversity of ideas, something you don't see much of on the lockstep left anymore. Unfortunately, 'diversity' has become synonymous with multiculturalism, another nice sounding word but is used as a bludgeon to tear down traditions, enforce relativism, equate the achievements of the West with a 7th century death cult....I could go on but I'm having my first cup of coffee. :)

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  6. The title of this post is curious. How is Martha Dean unmasked? It's my observation that with Ms. Dean what you see and hear is what you get - an unabashed unapologetic conservative/libertarian who does not waver, she isn't holding anything back. Agree or disagree, it's good to see someone running for office with principles.

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