Donald Trump is about to get schooled on constitutionalism.  On Wednesday, June 15, from Guns.com:

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump on Wednesday said he would meet with the National Rifle Association to discuss the terror and no-fly watch lists and preventing those on them from purchasing guns.

    I will be meeting with the NRA, who has endorsed me, about not allowing people on the terrorist watch list, or the no fly list, to buy guns. 

    — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 15, 2016

The NRA replied in part:

The NRA believes that terrorists should not be allowed to purchase or possess firearms, period. ...

At the same time, due process protections should be put in place that allow law-abiding Americans who are wrongly put on a watchlist to be removed. 

On Tuesday, Democrat politicians resurrected efforts to push legislation that bans individuals on the federal No-Fly List from being able to purchase firearms, dubbed "No Fly, No Buy."  On the surface, it makes perfectly reasonable sense.  From ijreview.com:

While the legislation is well-intentioned, it lacks any clarification on how the federal government can go about revoking the 2nd Amendment for citizens who have not been given due process.

 (That's why the process was declared unconstitutional in court in 2014.)

In a meeting with reporters on Tuesday, House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer said he cannot explain how individuals get their names put on or removed from the no fly list. Further, he added that he doesn't know how the proposal would comply with due process of law, saying:

"I'm gonna find this out because I ought to know that."

If he truly wants to find out, he needs to watch a brief video (2 min, 24 sec) of the partial testimony of Kelli Ann Burriesci, deputy assistant secretary for screening coordination, Office of Policy, DHS, where she is grilled by Representative Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.), before the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform Subcommittee on National Security, on "Terrorism and the VI SA Waiver Program," December 10, 2015.

Rep. Gowdy asks Ms. Burriesci, "What process is afforded a United States citizen before that person's Constitutional right is infringed?"

She replies that there is no process "before," but once you are put on it, there is a process (steaming mounds of bureaucratic compost) to get off it.

But it was a trick question.  Gowdy then informs Burriesci that he'd left out a key word.  The question should actually have been, "What 'due process' is afforded…?"  Because Americans are guaranteed that their rights cannot be taken away without "due process."  "It's in the Constitution."

Rep. Gowdy follows up the question with, "Is there another constitutional right that we treat the same way for American citizens, that we do the 2nd Amendment?"  He describes it as having a constitutional right "chilled" until you find out that it's chilled, and then you have to follow a petition process to have it reinstated.  He points out that gun control advocates are fine with doing that to the 2nd Amendment.  What about the 1st Amendment?  How about the 6th?

He adds, "Or my favorite – how about the 8th Amendment?  We're going to subject you to cruel and unusual punishment until you petition the government to get off the list."  He exposes with breathtaking clarity how leftists pretend that it's OK to treat the 2nd Amendment differently from how they treat other rights they consider sacrosanct.

If Donald Trump would watch that video, he wouldn't need to meet with the NRA.  It's 6th grade-level civics.

 As a postscript, there are several videos of Rep. Gowdy – a former prosecutor – eviscerating the testimonies of witnesses in hearings.  He's deliberate and eloquent, and his arguments are bulletproof.  But no one ever goes to jail as a result of exposing their assaults on the Constitution.  It makes for grand theater, but that's not what Congress was elected for.  They're not fixing things.

It's frustration with that impotence that has caused the grassroots to abandon traditional candidates and elevate Trump onto the stage.  It's not that the rubes actually believe his hyperbole; it's that we've stopped believing the usual suspects. 

We've been subjected to conservative candidates for decades now who say all the right things on the campaign trail but hang up their guns once elected sheriff.  The gallows never get erected.  The outlaws never swing.  The Constitution is laid waste.  What's our recourse?

Mike VanOuse is a Factory Jack – a rube – from Lafayette, Ind.