“States rights” is a means to an end. The Supreme Court legalized sodomy in Lawrence v. Texas, abortion in Roe v. Wade, and contraceptives in Griswold v. Connecticut: bad for states rights, good for individual rights. The Civil Rights Act ended Jim Crow: bad for states rights, good for individual rights. The 14th Amendment: bad for states rights, good for individual rights.

If we went back to the days of states rights, I assure you that my rights to have sex with men, own sex toys, or even cohabit with an unmarried partner would be taken away in the exact same states that respect your right to open-carry M-16’s in the middle of town.

Right now we have the right level of federalism. I don’t want to support anything that will risk the structural protections that we have for individual rights right now. You’re taking a myopic view that completely misses our 200 years of history with the limitations and issues of federalism.

I don’t expect in my lifetime to see the federal government protect my 2nd amendment rights.

But pretty soon, I expect to be able to move to Montana and do almost anything I want gun-wise.

Philip, I believe the average voter is so brainwashed about guns that I will never get a fair shake in my home state or at the national level.

All I can do if I want to live free is flee to a state that is waving the States Rights flag.

And it is marvelous that we have that pressure-relief valve.

God bless them, but would you really want the free-staters agitating in your community for some of the changes they want to government? Far better that they go somewhere else and do their own thing.

That way we can all stay happy (long-distance) neighbors.

I’m not implying anything, but I think it’s interesting that the “leave it to the states” approach to gun laws is one that was supported by Howard Dean. It’s a good way for the national party to hold onto those Midwestern swing states where both labor unions and the NRA have political sway while also recognizing the realities that Democratic governors, representatives, and senators from these states have to deal with. Dean himself was the governor of Vermont, which has very permissive gun laws last I checked.

Stormfront endorsed Ron Paul. I voted for Ron Paul. Am I a member of Stormfront?

I agree that things which are worth fighting for are worth fighting for everywhere. However, I’m also a realist and understand that people form tribes. The tribe of Idaho is much more apt to adopt gun laws I can live with than the tribe of California is. If given the opportunity to make that decision as a state, it means Californians – with their overwhelming representative presence at the Federal level – can’t impose their will upon Idahoans.

Would I like to see the same freedoms enjoyed across the country? Of course. Do I think that is realistic or possible to achieve? Unfortunately, no – so I’d like to at least give us the opportunity to have them in our tribe.

You’re also correct on the issue of rights – states don’t have them, people do. Obviously governments usually forget that little detail, so my goal is to bring the power of the government down to the lowest level possible, so the individual has the most influence possible. (I matter more as a constituent in Idaho than I do as a constituent of the USA… and more as a constituent of Latah County than of Idaho… so on and so forth.)

In the political discourse, “states rights” is something almost no one, historically, has ever supported on its own merits. It’s always brought up as a justification for something else, usually something that’s either of very local or limited concern (the effects of tariffs) or something that’s absolutely indefensible on its own merits (Jim Crow).

And it’s always been a bad argument. Human beings have rights, not states. Medical marijuana activists haven’t taken up the mantle of states’ rights, and there’s no reason they should: anything worth defending is worth defending on its own merits. I’m beyond caring about federalism because in practice, “states rights” have been an obstacle to human rights more often than they’ve been the slightest benefit.

I didn’t vote for him.

He’s not kept ANY of his promises.

He’s not a “uniter,” he’s an “untier.” Once untied, watch the whole thing unravel.

My take on it so far is this: Obama ran into a Congress that was dead set against him doing a lot of what he wanted, and it took him completely by surprise. The Republicans, predictably, were going to stonewall everything they felt they could get away with, just because Obama’s a (the horror!!) Democrat. This doesn’t come as a great surprise to me; the Republicans, as a collective, have become as radicalized over the last 10-12 years as the Democrats (again as a collective) had gotten some time before that. What Obama failed to predict was Congressional Democrats, led by Pelosi, making the same mistake that the other side had eight years previous — treating the election results as a Serious Mandate To Do Everything They Wanted… bipartisanship, statesmanship, effective government, and the health of the country be damned.

Obama seems to have done little to stem this tide. What I’ve heard from him and from administration officials doesn’t sound so much like they really agree with the loony left-wingers as that they don’t want to risk a showdown in order to actually start working on real solutions with realists from all parts of the political spectrum.

I miss the days of Carl Albert and Gerald Ford, of Jacob Javits and Scoop Jackson. Hell, I even miss Tip O’Neill.

It’s a genuine question. It’s entirely possible it happened and I just missed it for lack of attention paid.