A few stores in Brooklyn Center were left unmolested, however: businesses guarded out front by armed civilians.
Despite calls to violent “revolution” by looters, they did not appear interested in a confrontation with determined shopkeepers.
Gabriel Keane
April 13, 2021
Only Stores Left Untouched In Minneapolis Area Riots Were Guarded By Armed Civilians
[Unexpectedly!
Via email from Rolf.—Joe]
My colleagues and I are working hard to protect the 2nd Amendment. One measure I’ve taken is cosponsoring the Gun Owner Registration Information Protection (GRIP) Act, which would put an end to these two sweeping gun control measures. The GRIP Act would clarify existing law prohibiting the federal government from storing information acquired during the firearms background check process. Additionally, it would clarify the prohibition on the use of any federal funding by states or local entities for the storage or listing of sensitive, personal information related to the legal ownership or possession of firearms.
Jerry Carl
U.S. Representative Alabama’s First Congressional District
April 12, 2021
Carl: The fight to protect the 2nd Amendment
[Even if successful this would hardly “protect the 2nd Amendment”. It would be little more than a gesture in the correct direction.
This is not to say that Rep. Carl and his colleagues are enemies of the 2nd Amendment or even that they do not understand the problem or are not doing the best they can given the current situation.
But what is ultimately going to be required is the repeal of thousands of the laws that infringe the 2nd Amendment and the prosecution of those in government who have, or conspired to, violate our rights. Sure, it would have an extremely low chance of passage at the Federal level today, but how about introducing legislation providing for the funding of Federal law enforcement and prosecutors to investigate and prosecute state officials who have advocated for, passed, and enforced some of the most egregious gun control laws?
Just introducing such legislation will move the Overton Window and be a “shot across the bow” of the current course of gun grabbers.—Joe]
According to Daily Mail REVEALED: Biden’s nominee for ATF head is an anti-gun lobbyist who was at the Ruby Ridge standoff and Waco massacre – and lied about cult members shooting down helicopters.
The picture below is from the article. I’ve also seen this image several other places (here for example—H/T to John S. for the email):
That is the smoldering ashes of the Branch Davidian compound in Waco Texas and 76 of its residents in the background. It takes a special type of person to pose in front of that.
That he also apparently played a part the murders of innocent people at Ruby Ridge should make it clear what type of agency President Biden wants the ATF to be.
Prepare appropriately.
By nominating the man responsible for Waco, President Biden is sending a message.
He will kill you and your family by burning you alive, just to get your guns.
Doc. Block @MedicPlastic
Tweeted on April 7, 2021
[H/T to Robb Allen.
While it’s plausible, perhaps even certain, President Biden is unaware he is sending this particular message. But that message has certainly been sent.—Joe]
Are ghost guns guns useable by ghosts or guns that allow you to shoot ghosts? Because that makes a big difference in whether I want them banned or not.
Frank J. Fleming @IMAO_
Tweeted on April 8, 2021
[As pointed out by Shawn Slipknotyk @slipknotyk06, there is another possibility which should be considered. Perhaps a ghost gun is a gun that shoot ghosts out the barrel.
I think we need to move very slowly on this whole ghost gun banning thing. There are constitutional questions as well. Surely if the guns are for ghosts of U.S. citizens then such a law would be unconstitutional. And if the ghosts were “undocumented immigrants”, once they are in this country don’t they have the same rights to gun ownership as citizen ghosts?—Joe]
Via Sean D Sorrentino @SorrentinoSean:
And as Sean asks, “So I guess that’s how you see us?”
That hypothesis certainly fits the available data.
Tomorrow President Biden will nominate David Chipman to be the director of the ATF. Chipman is no stranger to this blog. I wrote about him as “Senior Policy Advisor” for the Gifford Group. And he was part of a set of cherry picked “experts” at a Gun Policy Summit.
It’s like nominating a Grand Cyclops of the KKK* to head the office of the African American Administration. No such branch of government should exist. And putting someone who despises the rights of the people most affected by the organization is a recipe for some very tough times for those wishing to exercise their rights.
* I didn’t know this until I was verifying the title of Grand Cyclops, but before candidates for membership in the KKK would be accepted they were asked, “Are you now or have ever been a member of the Radical Republican Party?” I could easily see identical language being used today for admission to anti-gun groups.
I’m the only one who has ever got them passed, man. The only gun control legislation that’s ever passed is mine. It’s going to happen again.
Joe Biden
POTUS
March 28, 2021
Biden Confident That Senate Will Approve Gun Control Legislation
[I know that Biden has been in politics for a long time but I didn’t realize he had the seniority to be a major player in the infringement of civil rights with NFA34. That’s truly impressive.
And I thought Senator Feinstein and Representative Schumer were authoring and pushing the evil Brady Bill and “Assault Weapon” ban legislation instead of Biden. I guess it must be the Alzheimer’s clouding my brain again such that I remember that wrong.—Joe]
If “woke” banks won’t do business with us, then people like me—political conservatives, mainstream Republicans—will have to have our own banks. If “woke” companies won’t sell to us, we’ll have to have our own merchandizing sector. If “woke” digital platforms won’t carry our views, we’ll have to make our own, and if—as in the case of Parler—there is a coordinated strike to take them down, we’ll have to restore our networks in a manner completely secure from such dangers.
This past weekend, my wife and I watched the movie “The Green Book.” In it, we saw a white and black man driving through the segregated South, where blacks basically lived in their own world—their own banks, restaurants, barbershops, and public lavatories and water fountains—and all because the whites flatly refused to do business with them.
It struck Debbie and me with the force of epiphany that this is where we seem to be heading. De facto segregation, not de jure segregation. And segregation not based on race but based on political viewpoint. It might seem overdramatic to say that Republicans and conservatives are the new blacks, but Republicans and conservatives are now treated in “woke” America with the same derision, contempt, and second-class citizenship that blacks were in the first part of the previous century.
Dinesh D’Souza
March 29, 2021
My Experience With ‘Woke’ Corporations
[Perhaps he was exaggerating some when he says they just now had the epiphany. If not, then he is a little slow on the uptake. It was obvious to me, and I posted about it, regarding the treatment of gun owners in 2006.
Still, better late than never and he has a much larger audience than I do.—Joe]
Via email from Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms:
BELLEVUE, WA – The Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms today announced it is updating its list of businesses and CEOs who push for increased gun control and prohibition, adding Kenneth Cole, Northwell Health and Mesirow to the roster.
CCRKBA’s “Don’t Feed the Gun Prohibitionists” project began last year with the creation of a dynamic list of businesses and CEOs who have been supporting new legislation designed to impair the rights of law-abiding firearms owners, said CCRKBA Chairman Alan Gottlieb. The current roster lists some 200 businesses and their CEOs.
“When we started this project,” Gottlieb said, “we were sometimes surprised, and in some cases disappointed, at some of the businesses we placed on the list. We discovered several brand name businesses and corporate leaders who evidently have a quiet agenda to limit gun rights. The listing is our way of letting current and potential patrons have the knowledge about what their hard earned dollars may actually be funding.”
Kenneth Cole is a global fashion brand, while Northwell Health is a health care conglomerate and the largest health care provider in the state of New York. Mesirow is a Chicago-based financial firm which supports the Giffords gun control lobbying group.
“We’re not calling for a boycott of these companies,” Gottlieb explained. “Businesses and the people who own them can support whatever kind of philosophy they want, and gun owning consumers can likewise not spend any money with those firms. Let the marketplace decide. Over 100 million American gun owners represent a sizeable consumer bloc, and they will decide on their own where to spend their money.”
Gottlieb said a free market dictates the right of consumers to know about the products they purchase, and that includes knowing whether a business they support may be working in the shadows to erode their constitutional rights.
“We encourage people buy products from companies they can count on to not support efforts aimed at curtailing constitutional rights,” he explained. “By providing this information, we hope gun owning consumers are making reasonable decisions about which businesses to patronize. This might convince some businesses to re-think their core values.”
It’s tough to avoid some of them. Costco and Microsoft, in particular, makes me very sad.
And I had a couple former co-workers trying to recruit me for Uber not long ago. I was never very keen on Uber anyway and this pretty much crosses them off the list of places I would go to work for. However, I suppose if I was desperate I would consider it.
Via email from Rofl: The Mathematics of Countering Tyranny by James Wesley Rawles.
I updated my blog post Boots on the ground with a link to the Rawles post.
My post was written in 2013. Rawles wrote his in 2018. In addition to having more up to date information it also has a lot more detail.
I feel like most of the politicians are pretty well polarized into one camp or another at this point, just like everybody else, and there’s not a whole lot we’re going to do other than keep some of the more soft pro-2A folks in line. Does arguing with people on social media work? Probably not. I’ve come to the conclusion social media is useful for sharing cat pictures and pictures of your rugrats for the grandparents, and that’s about it. People who spew politics all day on social media are boors, and who wants to be a boor?
Sebastian
March 24, 2021
What Activism Matters Anymore?
[I think this is a valid point.
I think that the best way to be an “activist” these days is to take new shooters to the range and keep them going back. The culture needs to change and the politics will follow.
Boomershoot is coming up in just one month. That is a great exposure to free America. Show them one or all of these videos:
Even if you and your guests just watch you will have a unforgettable experience. Do your part to restore freedom to our nation.—Joe]
Via Facebook on March 25, 2021:
Orofino is Idaho’s latest 2nd Amendment Sanctuary City, the City Council voted unanimously Tuesday evening in favor of Resolution no. 21-500 declaring it.
This is the closest city to Boomershoot (if you want to call a place with only about 3,100 people a city). This is also where I went to high school.
Via Chuck Petras @Chuck_Petras and Austin Petersen @AP4Liberty:
True. But expecting people to be rational is irrational.
Someone needs to make a cartoon showing a couple dead sheep and wolves moving off in the distance. Perhaps a farmer shouting “We must do something about the wolf threat.” In the next frame a Government Man stands at the door of a suburban house with a pair of pliers explaining that since wolves are dangerous to sheep, he’s going to pull the teeth out of their family Golden Retriever.
Sean D Sorrentino
Posted on Facebook on March 25, 2021
[While accurate and applicable I doubt the majority of people that need to get it would not actually understand. Those anti-gun people that do understand would not care. This is because they know gun control is not about protecting the sheep from wolves. It’s about protecting the Government Man from the farmer and his dog.—Joe]
March 19, 2021
An Open Letter to “The Squad”
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez
Rep. Ayanna Pressley
Rep. Cori Bush
Rep. Ilhan Omar
Rep. Jamaal Bowman
Rep. Rashida TalibWe have been in touch with Arizona’s Republican delegation to the House of Representatives, and they agree it would be commendable if members of the congressional “Squad” took daring action and joined JPFO in denouncing genocide, on Holocaust Remembrance Day, April 8, 2021.
More than one million Muslims are currently experiencing physical and cultural genocide at the hands of the Chinese communist government.
As always, it is consciously played down by mass media to the public, a true statement. This is also not the only atrocity happening right now on the planet. Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership, a 30-year-old civil-rights group, is uniquely aware of this abomination people perpetrate. Our advocacy of individual civil liberties recognizes that the main perpetrator of genocide is government.
It’s the truth.
Your voices are louder and heard more clearly than others in Congress. This is also true. Reach across the aisle, ignore the political and religious walls.
Join us in publicly renouncing any form of and all calls for annihilating people en masse for any reason. We eagerly await your reply.
Sincerely,
Alan Gottlieb, Chairman & CEO, Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership
Alan Korwin, Editor, The JPFO Bill of Rights Sentinel
Richard Busch, JPFO Ambassador
J.D. “Duke” Schechter, JPFO Ambassador
It made me smile even if no one in “The Squad” will read it or care.
From Kevin Baker on Facebook:
In the comments from a private Facebook post about anti-gun people someone simply said, “Grey’s Law”. I had to look it up:
Any sufficiently advanced incompetence is indistinguishable from malice.
I’m seeing behavior at work which could be accurately described by Grey’s Law. It’s very depressing. Evil should be punished. But the appropriate response to incompetence is less clear. Depending upon the context it can be very difficult to find the most appropriate path to resolution.
Yes. I am the one honest voice in the gun control community.
We are coming for your guns. First the assault weapons, then the saturday night specials (pistols), then the high powered sniper rifles and street sweepers (bolt guns and shotguns).
We are coming, we are legion.
Take All The Guns @GunzTake
Tweeted on March 16, 2021
[Via a private post on Facebook by Jonathan S.
I can believe everything except the last sentence. He is not going to be taking guns from anyone and they don’t have a legion of people willing to do the taking.
I do appreciate the majority of his tweet was honest and accurate though. That is rare among anti-gun people. Which, of course, makes me suspicious that they aren’t really an anti-gun person. Or, if they are, they are just a troll.
See also here.
Do not ever let anyone get away with telling you, “No one wants to take your guns.”—Joe]
From the Washington Times:
A federal appeals court Thursday ruled that a federal regulation barring bump stocks is likely illegal and was incorrect in claiming that the devices make a weapon a machine gun.
The 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the accessories are not subject to a 2018 ban imposed by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) at the order of then-President Donald Trump.
…
But, the 6th Circuit ruled in a 2-1 decision, the 2018 finding by BATF that bump stocks were machine guns, which reversed a 2010 finding on the same subject, was in error and the lower-court was wrong to refuse to issue an injunction against the regulation.
In the 2-1 decision, Judges Alice Batchelder and Eric Murphy ruled that the regulation alters criminal law and thus has to be done by Congress.
“it is not the role of the executive – particularly the unelected administrative state – to dictate to the public what is right and what is wrong,” they wrote.
Finally! Some good news from the courts on the gun rights front.
But why does this take nearly three years to decide?
And in another case, from Hawaii, which we lost
An appeals court ruled on March 24 that states may restrict people from openly carrying firearms in public—upholding a Hawaii regulation that severely limits open carry permits.
The U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled 7–4 that restrictions on carrying guns in public except for hunting don’t violate the Second Amendment’s right to bear arms.
This case started in 2012. That was nearly nine years ago!
At least the case can now be appealed to SCOTUS.
I suspect the reason for the extreme delays, another violation of the Bill of Rights, is because the “progressives” want more time to “fix” the courts.
