I have my vacation budget allocated up through Boomershoot this year or I would be on my way to Olympia Washington today to testify against the “universal background check” initiative. Gabrielle Giffords is coming in from Arizona to testify in favor of it. And almost for certain she will imply the initiative would have prevented the shooting in which she was a victim. This is rather odd because the guy that shot her passed a background check. She knows she can only make progress on her agenda if she is deceptive.
Barron Barnett and Anette Wachter say they are going.
Despite what KING5 says it is TODAY that we need your testimony. Here is where you go and what you do. It’s not hard. Even an introvert like me has successfully done it.
Be civil and succinct. Think “sound bite” instead of “essay”. Don’t repeat what others before you have said.
If you want some ideas on what to say read my Crazy Talk post. Or more succulently say something like this:
“Universal background checks” is crazy talk. They cannot be any more useful than bans on recreational drugs or underage drinking and smoking which are bypassed by any high school dropout in minutes.
The only thing the proposed legislation will be useful for is harassing people exercising their specific enumerated right to keep and bear arms. It will cast a chilling effect on this right and, if it were any other right being regulated in this manner, will be declared unconstitutional.
I am adamantly opposed to the proposal.
The only way Gabrielle Gifford’s expanded background checks could work would be if something on the order of the movie “Minority Report” were possible. It isn’t, so to put it charitably, the idea of expanded background checks actually making people safer is sci-fi, and to put it less charitably, is crazy talk.
And can you imagine some sort of test like this to buy wine or beer?
You guys with beer in your refrigerator are enabling drunk drivers across the country. You’re the NRA of Booze.
“You’re the NRA of Booze.”
Wouldn’t that be the NBA? 😉
Ah; the Milwaukee Brewers will have to change their name if we’re to maintain the mindset across the board. Obviously they’re promoting alcoholism, spousal abuse and drunk driving, and since no one has a right to do that, they have no right to keep that name. They are essentially criminals.
So, who’s going to – politely – point out that: a) None of Gabby’s proposals would have prevented the admittedly tragic event in which she was shot; and b) Gabby Giffords does not live – or more importantly, vote – in Washington State, so her opinion should mean little, if anything, to the people of Washington.
If Arizona, the state where she lives, doesn’t see fit to change their gun laws for her, why should any state where she doesn’t live?
Because she’s being used by people with evil agendas, much as Mr. Brady is?
The question of her precise mental capacity has come up, but has not been resolved. (Not complaining about that, really; HIPPA laws are a Very Good Thing.)
Still, I wonder each time she comes out in favor of some new gun restriction if she really understands and believes what she says, or if her injury has relegated her to the mental capacity of a small child and she’s doing/saying what she’s encouraged to do/say. Her speech patterns and mannerisms suggest the latter, but brain injuries are tricky things and it could just as easily be the former.
This in no way is to downplay her dramatic recovery from what could have been a fatal wound, and should not be read as such. That said, for better or worse she is now a public figurehead for the anti-gun-rights movement, and therefore is subject to the same criticisms regarding her logical capacity, mental health, and emotional stability that we apply to – for example – Joan Peterson.
Like Mr. Brady, another idiot by brain damage, being manipulated for fun and profit by a spouse with a totalitarian bent, supported, of course, by a vast cabal of leftists.
Victimhood makes you a Supreme Unquestionable Authority in opposing liberty, and with it you are elevated to the status of Guru, High Priestess, Messiah, or even God by the Progressive media. There is nothing more exalted, celebrated, sought after or longed-for in the Progressive mind than Victimhood. It justifies anything and absolves you of everything. A Public Acknowledgment of Victimhood is the very definition of Salvation for a leftist. Its analog in the Radical Muslim world (a similar mindset) is Martyrdom.
No one can oppose the Supreme Grand Exalted Victim acting as a Messiah delivering us from liberty without proving himself to be a heartless, sick bastard, or so we are meant to believe.
Both days were a lot of fun. No one really expected anything other then the legislature passing this hot potato to the people, but those hearings are the foundation for our campaign against this at the polls.
594 isn’t what it says it is and won’t do what it claims
The most salient diasgreement the entire time IMO, was what does the word “Transfer” mean. A discussion that I’ve had with friends regarding the initiative. In the context of “background check” people expect “transfer” to mean gun sale. It does not. Pam…. I forget her last name but she sat to the left of Cheryl Strombough on the 1st pro panel in the senate hearing… when Questioned by OBann about whether Brian Judy of NRA was correct about transfers, sat there and said it did not. Several proponents repeatedly claimed that transfers were narrowly defined and that Judy would have no problem loaning his gun to his 28 YO son while on public land shooting.
These were the sponsors of the initiative, speaking after Judy had read their opening sentence: “AN ACT Relating to requiring criminal and public safety background checks for gun sales and transfers…” and read the 4fi exceptions section that clearly woudn’t cover his anecdote (or my NRA classes).
But this is the kind of detail that doesn’t transfer well to a 60 second radio spot. If this is going to be denied, we will have to make it happen from the bottom/grassroots on up. Do not expect NRA to swoop in with 2million in media buys and make it all better. Polling in favor of “background checks” is HUGE. It’s going to come down to people like readers of VFNCI talking to people who are on the fence and convincing them of the -harm- 594 would do. Please read http://sos.wa.gov/_assets/elections/initiatives/FinalText_483.pdf , think carefully about how to convince people -on the fence- *you don’t need to convince folks here* and then go DO IT. -Boyd Kneeland WAC secretary, NRA training counselor
Soundbite: Do you want to become a felon by taking a firearms safety class? This law will make it illegal for a certified firearms instructor to hand you a gun to practice with for three shots, then simply hand back. You would have to run two background checks, and file paperwork just to do that. You would have to buy your own gun to bring to a class. It would make “try before you buy” from a friend illegal, and make both of you felons. How is that going to make you safer? They want you to fill out paperwork and pay a price for training and practice! Vote NO on 594!”
How’s that?
Pretty good, not good like the news shot last night of Giffords saying “… fight fight fight” but… yeah, you’re still on the hook IMO for person to person convincing : )