David Chipman, who never met a gun he liked, is President Biden’s nominee to head the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. He pointedly refused to define the “assault weapons” he plans to ban, leaving the category vague enough to include any gun he doesn’t like – that is, any gun.
But his disregard of the Constitution doesn’t stop there. He tells the BBC that the government should have power to ban any speech it considers “hate speech” from the internet, and of course to seize the guns of anyone using “hate speech.”
It is interesting that Chipman chose a foreign news source to vent his opinions. Perhaps he felt them too controversial for an American network. After all, Americans believe (or at least used to believe) that power flows from the people up, and that the people are the ultimate rulers. Europeans, on the contrary, believe that power flows from the rulers down, and what rights the people have are the gift of the rulers, to be taken away at the rulers whim. That view appeals to would-be totalitarians like Chipman.
The 2nd Amendment is to the Constitution what Jews are to racism – canaries in the coal mine: The first to die, but never the last. Stay tuned.