by David Safier
This is part of the continuing saga of Republicans going too far in their efforts to establish their Tea Party/NRA cred in a party where Crazy is the new Normal — or maybe being emboldened by their party's swing to the right to say what they were thinking all along.
This time the story is not from Arizona but Alaska which, given our new Palin resident(s) and the recent Palin/Brewer lovefest, may soon become our sister state.
Republican Representative Don Young of Alaska signed a "Letter of Declaration" at what he describes as an "'open-carry day'" in Fairbanks in the spring of 2009." Part of the Letter of Declaration states:
"Let it be known that should our government seek to further tax, restrict or register firearms … thus impairing our ability to exercise the God-given right to self-defense that precedes all human legislation and is superior to it, that the duty of us good and faithful people will not be to obey them but to alter or abolish them and institute new government laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form as to us shall seem most likely to effect our safety and happiness."
You can read the entire declaration here. When your garden variety wingnuts put their names to this kind of pledge, that's their choice. But when someone who swore to defend the Constitution when he took the oath of office signs a document recommending we "institute new government," that's another thing entirely.
You might be interested in knowing who wrote the Letter of Declaration. It was a young man named Schaeffer Cox, who was in the news recently when he was arrested as part of a murder-kidnap plot involving him and four others who were part of "a loose-knit militia group."
The five are charged with conspiring to commit murder, kidnapping and arson, weapons misconduct, hindering prosecution and tampering with evidence, the troopers said. They were arrested late on Thursday without incident, the troopers said.
One of those arrested, 56-year-old Lonnie Vernon, was charged with threatening to kill a judge and his family.
The Coalition to Stop Gun Violence (CSGV) created a petition "that calls on Rep. Don Young (R-AK) to re-swear his oath to the U.S. Constitution because he endorsed a document drafted by a militia leader recently indicted for plotting to kill law enforcement and government officials."
You can sign the petition here.