September 13, 2010 08:50 PM UTC

Even More U.N. Paranoia Coming Your Way

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• by: Colorado Pols

As the Durango Herald’s Joe Hanel reports, Dan Maes’ U.N. foibles aren’t deterring them:

J. Paul Brown and Brian O’Donnell are running for the state House of Representatives, but they spent some time talking about the federal government and United Nations in a debate Saturday…

Brown said Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was negotiating a treaty with the United Nations to take away Americans’ guns, which would spur a civil war.

“Who is the civil war between, and is this appropriate rhetoric to bring up in a state legislative race?” O’Donnell asked Brown.

“It’s a concern of mine,” Brown said. “You know, if you start taking away our guns, I’m sorry, people are going to stand up, and they’re not going to let it happen. The idea that Hillary Clinton is out there doing a treaty with the United Nations, it’s my opinion that maybe we just ought to get out of the United Nations.”

We’ve discussed the proposed U.N. Small Arms Treaty, which is meant to bring international firearms importation up to something resembling a coherent standard–despite the fevered paranoia that usually characterizes debate about this treaty among lay citizens, American gun laws are already quite strict like the NRA says, and the purpose of such a treaty is to bring the unregulated smuggling of arms around the world closer to our own level of oversight.

Meaning no American’s guns will be “taken,” and there are no grounds for a, um, “civil war.”

Rational discussion of this issue, in any event, should not immediately descend into threats of civil war, however hypothetical. We feel like we shouldn’t even have to point this out, but the experience of the last two years seems to have normalized this kind of nonsensical behavior. Those looking to poke idle fun at the ridiculousness of J. Paul Brown’s rhetoric should note that he is running to replace GOP Rep. Ellen Roberts in HD-59, a Republican running to fill a Republican seat in a Republican year, and according to Dick Wadhams, anyway, is expected to win.

On the upside, he’ll make getting actual work done in the legislature next year, um, entertaining.

UPDATE: More fascinating J. Paul Brown views here.