Hey gunbloggers - Yoo hoo

By Libby

The focus on Yoo's memo has been mainly about the torture excuses and the assertion that Ashcroft signed off on it. He apparently didn't. But I would think that Second Amendment bloggers would be more than little concerned about this item.

The Justice Department concluded in October 2001 that military operations combating terrorism inside the United States are not limited by Fourth Amendment protections against unreasonable searches and seizures, in one of several secret memos containing new and controversial assertions of presidential power. [...]

The Fourth Amendment assertion is one of several far-reaching legal arguments revealed by the disclosure Tuesday of a 2003 Justice Department memo that authorized harsh military interrogations. In its footnotes, asides and central text, that 81-page memo asserted nearly unlimited presidential powers during a time of war, although the Justice Department later said the military should not rely on its reasoning.

The way I read this, all Bush has to do is declare a national terrorist emergency and he can send his stormtroopers into the streets of America and confiscate your guns, the law and the constitution be damned. Furthermore, if a president wanted to declare martial law for some reason, any reason, this memo would pretty much allow it.

I'm often assured that would never happen, but I have to ask, if the administration never even contemplated such a move, why on earth would they go to the trouble to lay a 'legal' framework for it and I might remind you that this is not the only justification they have put into place to do so. Let's not forget the de facto repeal of Posse Comitatus. Add to that the massive database the administration has assembled including phone calls, internet communications and financial transactions which would give them the ability to pinpoint who owns the guns and it looks to me like the government could disarm the citizenry a lot more efficiently and swiftly than they can terrorists.

Maybe they'll never use this power, but is anyone willing to take that chance? And if you're willing to trust this administration with that kind of power, ask yourself if you're willing to trust the next one. The precedents don't disappear just because the players change.