By Joe Belanger @ Shutterstock.com
For years now, the investment world has watched as pension funds and money managers have weaponized their financial power against the political opponents of left-wing Democrats. This pressure has been applied via the implementation of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) standards, which judge companies based on their adherence to the often flawed guidelines of the radical left. (Learn much more about ESG from Your Survival Guy who has covered it extensively here). Energy companies, gun manufacturers, cigarette companies, certain media companies known for their conservative viewpoints, and others have been blacklisted in these new funds.
The pressure to conform to ESG standards or risk losing investment dollars has pushed many companies to adopt policies demanded by left-wing politicians and their allies in the money management industry. Now, government pension funds are demanding direct actions from companies like credit card issuers to assist in the infringement of rights like the Second Amendment. Judge Andrew Napolitano explains at LewRockwell.com, writing (abridged):
Under pressure from the governors of New York and California and their enormous state pension funds, Visa, Mastercard and American Express have agreed to keep a list of commercial transactions made through their credit card systems at gun shops. These credit card middlemen make more money the more purchasers spend, but this pivot to social activism, though lawful, is dangerous to freedom and manifests an antipathy to constitutional norms by the corporations whose services many of us employ without a second thought. Of course, the government involvement is unconstitutional.
The pension funds, managed by state government officials with known animosities to lawful gun ownership, are large shareholders in the credit card companies. Their public pressure on the credit card companies to do anything to chill lawful gun ownership constitutes the use of government financial power to erode Second Amendment rights, which the Supreme Court has upheld three times since 2008.
The government officials who have pushed the credit card companies to do this apparently do not take seriously their oaths to uphold the Constitution. Or, perhaps, they deceptively take the oath of office to a Constitution as they wish it to be, and not as the court has interpreted it.
Many states already unconstitutionally keep track of gun ownership. Thanks to the credit card companies, the feds can now do so as well.
What should you do if you used a credit card to make a gun shop purchase and the feds come knocking at your door asking to see your hardware? You should ask to see their search warrant. They won’t have one, in which case you should politely say, “Have a good day” and close and lock your door. Then call your local police and report unwanted knocking on your door by an armed stranger.
Does anyone in government take rights seriously?
By Andrew P. Napolitano
Read more here.
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