"The no-fly list is a civil rights disaster by every conceivable standard"

The democrats loose Gawker on the "sit-in":  "The Democrats Are Boldly Fighting For a Bad, Stupid Bill"

After Democrats in the Senate staged a filibuster in support of gun control measures, their colleagues in the House have begun a “sit-in” aimed at embarrassing Republicans into allowing a vote on a measure that would restrict the ability of suspected terrorists to legally buy guns. The move is fantastic political theater. It’s also a tremendous waste of popular support and activist energy in support of a measure that isn’t just ineffective but also actively offensive.

The Democratic proposal has been catch-phrased and hashtagged as “no fly, no buy,” because it would prevent people who end up on government terrorism watchlists, including the “no fly list,” from purchasing firearms. This would do little to reduce gun violence, but it would add an additional layer of surveillance and government scrutiny to a particular class of people.

The no-fly list is a civil rights disaster by every conceivable standard. It is secret, it disproportionately affects Arab-Americans, it is error-prone, there is no due process or effective recourse for people placed on the list, and it constantly and relentlessly expands. As of 2014, the government had a master watchlist of 680,000 people, forty percent of whom had “no recognized terrorist group affiliation.” This is both an absurdly large number of people to arbitrarily target in gun control legislation, and far, far too few to have any meaningful effect on actual gun ownership, let alone gun violence. (more)

I’m honestly not being coy: What is “epic” about sitting on the floor of a room that you are legally entitled to be in?

— Charles C. W. Cooke (@charlescwcooke) June 23, 2016

Reuters: "Federal judge rules U.S. no-fly list violates Constitution"

"The U.S. government's no-fly list banning people accused of links to terrorism from commercial flights violates their constitutional rights because it gives them no meaningful way to contest that decision, a federal judge ruled on Tuesday."

U.S. District Judge Anna Brown... ordered the government to come up with new procedures that allow people on the no-fly list to challenge that designation.

"The court concludes international travel is not a mere convenience or luxury in this modern world. Indeed, for many international travel is a necessary aspect of liberties sacred to members of a free society," Brown wrote.

The no-fly list, established in 2003 in the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, bars those on it from flying within the United States or to and from the country...  

"Is nothing sacred"