On Tenther Hooks

The Tenthers are back in the news, fighting the bad fight for states' rights against federal laws (while continuing to take as much federal money as possible.) This time they're combining their two favorite pastimes:  Obama Derangement Syndrome, and firearms.

Under the rationale that the federal government only has the power to regulate issues that affect inter-state commerce, they've been pushing legislation in states from Florida to Alaska that would exempt guns and ammunition made within the state from federal gun laws. The idea is "the latest crack cocaine for gun-rights advocates," says Peter Hamm of the Brady Campaign.

In seven states, bills have already been passed into law, and they've been introduced in 20 others. (Here's a state-by-state map of where things stand.)

In most cases, say experts, the laws won't have much practical effect, because very few of the guns sold in a given state -- not to mention the ammunition they fire -- were made in that state. They're also likely unconstitutional, according to gun control groups, since the supremacy clause makes clear that federal laws trump state laws when the two are in conflict. In Oklahoma, Governor Brad Henry, a conservative Democrat, recently vetoed the bill, saying it wasn't worth the cost of defending it in court because it would ultimately be struck down. Court challenges have already been launched in Wyoming and Montana. "We will take [the laws] seriously until the federal courts throw them out, as we presume," says Hamm.

But in the context of other recent conservative challenges to federal action, the effort seems as much designed to make a point about state sovereignty as to make guns more accessible. It's in keeping with the conservative challenge to the health-care reform law on similar grounds -- and even with the new suggestion from Arizona right-wingers that states can determine who is and isn't a U.S. citizen. 

Once again, you have to view this in the context of the larger battle:  there's a growing movement out there to invalidate as much of the federal government as possible while saying that states have the power to do whatever they want inside their own state.  If that means states have the power to ignore federal mandates and regulations, so be it...just as long at the feds continue to send federal taxpayer money collected from blue states to run red state programs for infrastructure, health care, and Social Security.

The hysterical thing is that the Republicans behind the Tenther movement are the same ones screaming that the feds haven't done enough to stop the oil spill in the Gulf or the immigration problem along the Mexican border.  Even better, at the national level the GOP is doing everything they can to block both raising liability caps on energy companies for oil spills, and any sort of comprehensive national immigration reform.

In other words, Tenthers want all the federal revenue, and then none of the federal oversight.  Republicans aren't serious about solving problems, just serious about pandering to voters with illogical and unsustainable wishful thinking.

Anything to serve as justification to hide their actual agenda.