Saturday, January 8, 2011

Why Can't We Have More First Amendment Remedies?



The above is a video Democratic Representative Gabrielle Giffords reading the First Amendment on January 6th, 2011. It was part of a larger act where members of the United States Congress read the US Constitution aloud in hopes of reminding everyone of just what our nation is founded on.

On January 8th, 2011, she was shot in the head.

Sharron Angle, back in January of 2010, made a comment that for most of 2010 wound up haunting her. This is her exact quote:

You know, our Founding Fathers, they put that Second Amendment in there for a good reason and that was for the people to protect themselves against a tyrannical government. And in fact Thomas Jefferson said it's good for a country to have a revolution every 20 years.

I hope that's not where we're going, but, you know, if this Congress keeps going the way it is, people are really looking toward those Second Amendment remedies and saying my goodness what can we do to turn this country around? I'll tell you the first thing we need to do is take Harry Reid out.

On January 8th, 2011, Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords was shot in the head.

I've constantly have fought for the First Amendment, and truthfully, I never truly understood it until today when I saw that video of her reading it aloud. When we think of the First Amendment, we normally think about Freedom of Speech, followed by Freedom of Religion.

But how many of us even think about the fact that we are also given the ability to peacefully assemble? How often do we remember that we also have the right to petition out government when we don't like what they're doing? That our freedom of speech is actually more than being able to simply say what we want, but to also change things by petitioning them?

On January 8th, 2011, Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords was shot in the head while giving a speech by a 22-year-old man who was mad at his government and wanted to change it.

After all the talk we've had over the past year, with so many people alluding to violence against politicians, why? Why violence? Why "second amendment remedies"? The first one alone would have fixed it.

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To that end, I would like to encourage everyone to do more to help the First Amendment. Please, give to the ACLU, The Comic Book Legal Defense Fund, or The First Amendment Center. We need more people using the 1st Amendment instead.

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