“TRUE!!!”

That’s president-elect Donald Trump’s response to a post on his social media platform claiming that he plans to declare a “national emergency” and use the US armed forces to abduct and deport immigrants on a very large scale.

It’s not a good idea to bet the ranch on campaign promises, especially Trump’s. In 2016, he was going to build a big, beautiful wall and make Mexico pay for it, but instead he ended up illegally misappropriating US taxpayer funds to build a partial, ineffectual, symbolic wall.

Which, by the way, Joe Biden continued construction on, just as he largely continued Trump’s other immigration polices, which in turn were pale copies of Barack Obama’s immigration policies, differing only in his screeching that Obama and Biden supported “open borders” even though they each abducted more immigrants than Trump ever managed to.

But we should, I suppose, at least entertain the notion that Trump really means this one, and that he’s stupid and evil enough to give it the old college try.

As I’ve explained many times, I’m no “constitutionalist,” but since those who rule us claim to be both empowered to do so by, and obedient to, the US Constitution, I’m all for holding them to it … and letting them suffer the consequences of violating it.

Item One: The US Constitution forbids the US government to regulate immigration with the sole exception of imposing a small head tax (see Article I, Section 9; Article V, and Amendment X).

Item Two: The US Constitution forbids government at all levels to infringe the right to keep and bear arms (see Amendment II).

Item Three: Laws repugnant to the Constitution are void (see Madison v. Marbury).

QED, when someone attempts to abduct, cage, or deport an immigrant, even under color of one of those void unconstitutional “immigration laws,” that person is just a common criminal, attempting to commit a violent crime. The prospective victim, and/or others acting in the defense of the prospective victim, are entitled by both right and constitutional protection to resist,  up to and including the use of deadly force.

Would I rather it didn’t come to that? Absolutely. I’d rejoice if the country’s ICE agents and such voluntarily handed in their gang colors and returned to useful jobs in the private sector.

But if they need stronger incentives to straighten up and fly right, that’s on them.

As my friend Nicky Reid, aka comrade hermit, suggested the last time Trump started in with this nonsense, “we the people” should arm the undocumented.

More than 100 million Americans own hundreds of millions of firearms. If, say, five million of them donated reasonably good handguns to the prospective victims of Trump’s deportation plans, ICE agents and the military personnel Trump wants to illegally order to participate in immigrant abductions would soon be finishing their shifts in bags with tags on their toes instead of at home digging in to dinner.

Strong incentives, see?

Stronger still if applied early enough to ensure Trump doesn’t even try.

Thomas L. Knapp (X: @thomaslknapp | Bluesky: @knappster.bsky.social | Mastodon: @knappster) is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

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Let’s get my “news hook” out of the way: President-elect Donald Trump has been offering up names for appointments to his cabinet, and rattling a constitutional saber about using “recess appointments” to get around the constitutional  requirement that those appointees be confirmed by the US Senate.

I’m not really interested in the details of that argument here. What I’m interested in is the nearly too obvious to bother stating fact it highlights: Many Americans, of many political persuasions, seem discontent with the way “the government” “runs” “the country.”

As you can tell by the sequential scare quotes, I’ve got problems with all three implicit claims, but let’s assume that the federal government (aka “the United States”) actually “runs” (that is, dictates and enforces everything its principals declare themselves  interested in) what most people think of as “the country” (a particularly defined land mass on the continent known as “North America”).

Let’s further assume that it does so on the basis of notional authority conferred by a document ratified by a tiny fraction of a single percent of the population of that “country” circa 1787: The US Constitution.

Yes, I know, that document proclaims itself the work of “we the people,” but very few of the people supposedly living under its rule had, or have, any voice in either its framing or  its subsequent impositions.

That said, again, many Americans seem perpetually unhappy with the results. They don’t like this bill getting passed by Congress or that ruling handed down by the Supreme Court or so-and-so getting elected president. It never ends.

So, my question: When do we stick a fork in it and admit it’s done?

Second, my response to the “you can’t be serious” crowd, which I will hand off to Lysander Spooner:

“But whether the Constitution really be one thing, or another, this much is certain — that it has either authorized such a government as we have had, or has been powerless to prevent it. In either case it is unfit to exist.”

He wrote that, believe it or not, in 1870.

Many Americans, including me, notice that the Constitution only seems to be obeyed when those in power find obeying it convenient.

Some Americans, not including me, fantasize that it’s not only possible to force government to obey it, but that doing so would magically solve all the problems that have them so upset so much of the time. It’s not possible, nor would it produce those results.

As Rita Mae Brown wrote in 1983 (you may have seen the quote attributed to others), “insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, but expecting different results.”

That’s “constitutionalism” in a nutshell.

For 237 years, politicians have pretended the Constitution “works” … and most Americans have pretended with them, even while proclaiming their unhappiness with its results in ways small and large (for the latter, consider 1861-65).

Same thing over and over.

Same results over and over.

And that’s how things are going to stay until we decide to try something different.

Thomas L. Knapp (X: @thomaslknapp | Bluesky: @knappster.bsky.social | Mastodon: @knappster) is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

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In the wake of the latest presidential election, it’s morning in America!

Well, maybe not, but a lot of people seem to be talking about Bluesky, which implies sun, which implies morning. OK, yeah, a stretch — the newly popular social media platform sounds more like an ELO fan site than a Reagan-era campaign slogan.

But the “newly popular” part — Bluesky launched in early 2023 as an invite-only beta, then in early 2024 to the general public — does seemingly have a lot to do with the presidential election.

My news feeds are all a-bulge this week with headlines and analyses about a “migration” from Elon Musk’s X (formerly Twitter) to Bluesky.

The evidence for such a migration: Bluesky is growing quickly, X is shrinking slowly, and many Bluesky users have been very vocal about abandoning X for Bluesky because, well, MAGA.

Nothing wrong with that, I guess. Musk has certainly gone out of his way to cater to the MAGA set, while Bluesky finds itself painted, by supporters and detractors alike, as a “safe space” for moderates, progressives, Democrats, liberals, et al.

I’m personally sympathetic to those who prefer social media “silos” curated to their own tastes. Most of us live that way in meatspace — like me, you’ve probably never invited David Duke over for dinner or signed up for a Nazi bar pub crawl — and extending that to a “there ain’t enough room on this platform for both of us” philosophy doesn’t strike me as strange or inherently wrong.

On the other hand, nearly every social media platform allows considerable self-siloing, so there really IS enough room on those platforms for various people and groups who don’t care to talk to each other.

Follow the users you like, ignore or even block the users you don’t like. “Problem” solved.

One recent teapot tempest with X came about when Musk decreed that, henceforth, blocked users may view the posts of (although not engage with) users who have blocked them. Not a biggie, in my opinion, except to those actively seeking something to get upset about. Especially since it’s always been easy to get around the “no viewing” part by using an alternate account.

If you just can’t stand the “MAGAts” on X, or the “leftards” on Bluesky, you can leave one platform or the other … or you can learn to walk and chew gum at the same time by following, ignoring, and blocking to create the experiences you want in more than one forum.

Personally, I maintain accounts on many social media platforms (including X and Bluesky). I use some more actively than others, depending on how well their functions/environments serve my purposes.

But that’s just me. There’s really no wrong answer.

Thomas L. Knapp (X: @thomaslknapp | Bluesky: @knappster.bsky.social | Mastodon: @knappster) is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

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