| ORCID | https://orcid.org/ 0000-0003-2641-962X |
| Academia | https://saybrook.academia.edu/DavidBenfell |
| Substack | https://substack.com/@benfell |
| Not Housebroken | https://nothousebroken.substack.com |
| BlueSky | https://bsky.app/profile/disunitedstates.org |
David Benfell, Ph.D. (he/him/his)
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Ph.D. Human Science (Saybrook University, 2016), vegetarian ecofeminist (#vegan and #libertariansocialist) scholar, #anticapitalist. Disgusted by Republicans, furious at the Democrats.
Oooh! Make me an 11/70 please!
https://github.com/dbrll/ll-34
https://github.com/dbrll/ll-34
“You do not actually oppose the Iran War if you support unconditional offensive military aid to [Binyamin] Netanyahu. Don't led the Democratic Congressional leadership pretend otherwise.”[1]
[1] Stephen Zunes, “March 28, 2026 (Saturday),” March 29, 2026, https://stephenzunes962006.substack.com/p/march-28-2026-saturday
Smudge The Insult Cat 🐀
In my original argument that the Second Amendment protects a collective, that is, government, right to bear arms, not any individual right, I pointed to several reasons:
1. Militia, as described in Article I, Section 8, of the U.S. Constitution,[1] resembles the National Guard—under the jurisdiction of the states. The vagueness of the second amendment in also referring to a militia[2] permits the same interpretation.
2. There appears to be no upper limit in the second amendment to the arms that may be borne. I argued that an individual right to bear arms implied an individual right to nuclear arms.
Well, here we are, with the U.S. Department of Justice under Donald Trump refusing to rule out that the individual right to bear arms includes, yes, nuclear arms.[3]
[1] U.S. Const., Art. I, §8.
[2] U.S. Const., Amend. 2.
[3] Tess M. Fardon and Shira Lauren Feldman, “Trump DOJ Refuses to Rule Out Second Amendment Right to Nuclear Weapons,” Slate, March 27, 2026, https://apple.news/ASh6aIVpqTyC2U142YjbazA
Trump DOJ Refuses to Rule Out Second Amendment Right to Nuclear Weapons — Slate
March 27, 2026 | 1:48 PM Photo illustration by Slate. Sign up for Executive Dysfunction, a weekly newsletter that surfaces under-the-radar stories about what Trump is doing to the law—and how the law is pushing back. Of the sheer number of absurdist stories you may have missed in the news recently, one is that in public court filings slamming common-sense laws to prevent gun violence, President Donald Trump’s Department of Justice refused to rule out nuclear weapons from the kinds of arms it
