by Allen Clifton
Oh, no.
Many wingnuts believe, all the way down to their bones, that our Second Amendment is there to give Americans the ability to “rise up” against the federal government in some kind of armed revolt.
Putting aside the laughable thought that a bunch of wingnuts think that they can defeat the greatest military in the history of all humankind with guns bought from Walmart, this notion that we have the right to overthrow our government makes absolutely no sense.
Let’s say, right now, wingnuts decided to throw President Obama out of office through an armed rebellion. Though let’s ignore the fact that our Constitution sets up a process by which we can oust a sitting president. But ignoring all the other glaring realities we have to in order to believe that this is possible, let’s just say they were successful in removing him from office through some sort of armed revolt. Then following his removal from office, let’s say we held presidential elections just as we normally would.
And we elected Hillary Clinton.
Then let’s say they don’t like what she’s doing, so they manage to successfully stage a second armed rebellion that overthrows another sitting president. And, again, we elect our next president through the normal process.
Only this time we elect Elizabeth Warren. Someone else with which these wingnuts will strongly disagree on pretty much everything.
What then? Do they just keep overthrowing these Constitutionally elected presidents until they get one that they like? Do they try to rig our election system until it elects a candidate they support?
And isn’t overthrowing a government that’s elected by the people extremely, you know, anti-American? Because what about those tens of millions of Americans who do support the government (or president) that was just overthrown? Do their votes suddenly not matter?
Then doesn’t that “second revolution” actually become kind of a fixed wingnut-controlled dictatorship based on electing politicians that they want elected? Because what’s the point of an armed revolution against the government, if the people who elected that government you just overthrew… end up electing the same types of people to the “new” government the next time around?
Meaning that the only way a “second revolution” makes any sense would be for those who staged the revolt to rig the system in such a way that only the kinds of politicians they want elected – can actually get elected.
Which would mean that tens of millions of Americans would instantly have their votes nullified. Something that would be extremely unconstitutional. Unless, of course, these “revolutionaries” planned to unilaterally change our Constitution to fix the “problem” of Americans voting in politicians they don’t want elected. Which would also be extremely unconstitutional.
See where I’m going with this?
In no way, in any logical manner, does it make any sense to believe that our Second Amendment is meant to overthrow a Constitutionally elected government.
Because by doing so, not only would that mean that those Americans who did support the president (or government) would instantly have their Constitutional voting rights nullified, but it would also mean that those overthrowing our government would have to take unconstitutional measures to change our Constitution to better suit their ideology.
And none of that is even the least bit Constitutional.
So, in reality, it would take a massive violation of the Constitutional rights of tens of millions of Americans, and a huge violation of our Constitutional process for changing that very Constitution, for this “second revolution” to even have a point.
It’s actually ironic that these Americans who believe that they can rise up against the government to “protect the Constitution” – would essentially be pissing all over it if they actually got their way.
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