Category Archives: Gun Rights

A Chilling Effect

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While it’s not always possible to evade government mandates, registering your guns just puts them on a shopping list for sticky-fingered officials. That’s true of registering anything that you value and that powerful people might fear or covet.

Even more concerning, though, is the prospect of governments in supposedly free societies conducting intelligence operations against their people and punishing those who hold disapproved ideas. That’s a great argument for getting rid of the need for government permission to go about our lives. Politicians will never approve of those who disagree with them, but we shouldn’t need their approval.

J.D. Tuccille
October 25, 2024
New Zealand Government Punishes Gun Owners for Their Political Beliefs

Way back when I started getting into guns, I thought everyone was in agreement that free speech was a good thing. While considered extremely bad form, it was legal for Nazis to have a peaceful march through Jewish neighborhoods. As near as I can recall, 30 years ago there wasn’t any real consequences to not believing the 16th Amendment was properly ratified, or that the moon landings were faked.

That is not the case anymore. New York passed a law (recently thrown out by the courts) requiring people to hand over your social media accounts to the government before you can get a concealed carry license. People have lost their jobs at Facebook for donating a couple thousand dollars to President Trump’s campaign. Others have lost their jobs for saying men, in general, were better at certain things and women were better at other things.

There currently is a deliberate chilling effect on the exercise of fundamental rights. There is some push back, as in the repeal of the New York law, but it is going to take a lot more time and resources to restore the free exercise of our rights to where they should be.

Great Question–I’ve Got Answers

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If “extremists” use objective facts, state and federal law, lower court rulings, the Constitution, and Supreme Court decisions; what is a good, succinct term for folks like Terrence Cummings who actively reject all that, and prefer falsehoods and feelz?

Carl Bussjaeger
September 29, 2022
Achievement Unlocked! | The Zelman Partisans

How about one or more of these?

Racial Minorities Voting for a White Supremacist?

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In other words the entire event despite its marathon length and hodgepodge of z-list speakers, delivered over and over again a very focused message. The Trump campaign is about retribution and revenge. It is about the white supremacist desire to purge America of all their neighbors of different colors and beliefs. It is about Trump’s desire to seek out his enemies and punish them. And over the course of its Wagnerian length (and resonances) it single out group after group that would be deported or punished.

From a political perspective the strategy is pure suicide. The rally will almost certainly alienate more voters who might have voted for Trump and it is hard to imagine it has earned him one single new vote. (Unless there is a Franz Liebkind somewhere who has been too busy writing “Springtime for Hitler” to have paid attention to the campaign until now.) It was a play to the base when the biggest problem Trump has in this election is breaking through his rock solid ceiling of around 47 percent of the electorate.

David Rothkopf
October 27, 2024
Opinion: Donald Trump’s Racist NYC Rally Was Vile. It Was Also Political Suicide

I found these claims very interesting. How do we reconcile Rothkopf’s white supremacist and Hitler assertions with:

Do these increasing numbers of non-whites want a white supremacist in the White House?

And on the gun control issue Kamala Harris has far better alignment with Hitler than Donald Trump.

The only way I can resolve the issue is to conclude is that either in Rothkopf’s universe the sky is a different color, or he is deliberately lying.

Good to Know

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Standout details from the complaint include an RV stash and an attempted “boating accident.” Turns out ATF just sends a dive team, by the way. Freeman continued the Gravedigging tradition by asking his friends to unknowingly hold his hottest products and, unsurprisingly, this backwoods network collapsed the first time a lawman made a phone call.

legio
October 22, 2024
Obnoxii Civitati

Via a post on X by Chuck Petras @Chuck_Petras.

There are multiple lessons to be learned here. Here are the two most obvious to me:

  • Don’t have your “boating accident” underneath a bridge in diveable waters.*
  • Three people can keep a secret… if two of them are dead.

* If I recall correctly, in the book Breaking Blue (spoiler alert) a gun was disposed of in the Spokane River Falls. The river was diverted, incidental to gun retrieval, and the gun was recovered during the diversion.

In the classical use of a “boating accident” one should claim the accident occurred “somewhere” in a large and deep body of water, such as “somewhere in the Pacific Ocean”. This would reduce the risk of the ATF “sending a dive team” to demonstrate you lied to them. But Lake Michigan (22,405 square miles and 928 feet deep) or Lake Pend Oreille in Idaho (148 square miles and 1,158 feet deep) would be beyond the practical capabilities of almost all dive teams. Keep in mind the U.S. Navy does conduct acoustic underwater submarine research in Lake Pend Oreille and may have capabilities beyond what one might expect.

KKK Returns as Prop. KK

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Via email from the creator about a proposition on the ballet in Colorado:

See also:

Six Month Wait for an Appointment to Have Your Fingerprints Taken

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Massachusetts law prohibits the issuance of a firearms license before the State Police complete a background check based on an applicant’s fingerprints. For individuals residing in Boston, after an application is submitted to the Boston Police Department, the Department’s Licensing Unit makes them wait for many month before they are provided with an appointment to have their fingerprints taken. It is currently estimated the wait time is more than six (6) months for an appointment.

Prior to this litigation, the Licensing Unit engaged in a practice that made individuals seeking licenses wait for months on a “wait list” to merely submit their applications – a practice that was abandoned in response to litigation from some of the Plaintiffs in this case. The Boston Police Department has seemingly traded one mechanism to effectuate lengthy delays with another, all in an effort to prevent peaceable Bostonians from obtaining firearms.

Second Amendment Foundation
August 31, 2024
White v. Cox – Second Amendment Foundation

People who do this sort of crap should be prosecuted.

Another Law Bites the Dust

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This is yet another important victory for Second Amendment rights and another major loss for New York, authoritarian governments, and radical anti-rights organizations like Everytown and Gifford.

We will continue to fight forward as we work to restore the full scope of the right to keep and bear arms throughout the United States. Hopefully Kathy Hochul is ready to write another check for legal fees.

Brandon Combs
President of the Firearms Policy Coalition
October 11, 2024
New York loses round in gun fight over open carry

The Second Amendment Foundation also contributed to this case.

Ignore the two references to “open carry” in the article. That was just the author demonstrating their ignorance. It was all about concealed carry in stores, parking lots, and other private property generally open to the public.

The state of New York made it law saying the default situation was that bearing arms on private property is prohibited unless you were given permission by the owner. This is sometimes called a “vampire law”. The judge ruled that the default has to be you are allowed to carry unless you are given notice otherwise.

This victory was at the district court level. It is possible the appeals court will see things differently and SCOTUS will have to slap them down again.

The FPC does a lot of good work, and I donate money to them each month with matching funds from my employer.

You can also follow them on X to get a sense of what they are up to and how things are going. They also tend to be very entertaining.

It is What Socialists and Communist Do

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This hotline is nothing more than a page out of the Stasi playbook – encouraging children to spy on their own families. This is a dangerous step toward weaponizing children in households for the left, and an outrageous government overreach under the guise of public safety.

Rep. Angela Rigas
R-Caledonia
Michigan legislature creates tip line for students to anonymously turn in parents for ‘improperly’ stored guns – The Midwesterner

I know China did the same sort of thing. I expect all socialist and communists weaponize everything they can to acquire and keep power.

Free Speech and Guns are Essential

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The dangers of werewolves and socialists make the ready access of information and guns critical to our survival. And, conversely, the repression of this access is critical to the spread of socialism and werewolves.

The First and Second Amendments. They are not just good ideas. They are the law.

A Good Start

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Inadvertence and ignorance of the law by government is no more of an excuse for violating civil rights than when a citizen ‘inadvertently’ violates the law and is arrested and prosecuted. I will begin drafting my Complaint seeking relief, including personal fines against the city officials under whose jurisdiction this knowing and willful enactment occurred. You may want to inform the relevant officials that they are not allowed to use tax dollars to defend themselves from such liability, and that any fine assessed will be personally payable by them, to alleviate your concerns about tax dollars.

Eric J. Friday
General Counsel of Florida Carry, Inc.
September 28, 2024
Florida Officials Who “Inadvertently” Banned Guns Prior to Hurricane May Pay – The Truth About Guns

Remember, a couple weeks ago, when a small town in Florida decided to suspend the 2nd Amendment because of the hurricane? The quote above is the response after the town apologized and said they hadn’t prosecuted anyone for violating their illegal order.

It’s not a criminal prosecution, but Florida law does say the government officials responsible for an illegal ordinance can be personally fined for their illegal acts. I hope other politicians pick up on this clue.

It is a good start.

Plausible Hypothesis

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Their panic is because this would lead to the final demise of their hopes of full gun bans someday.

That hope was tied to demographic decline of white men, the biggest gun-owning group. If women and people of color are also gun owners at growing rates, that dream dies.

Kostas Moros @MorosKostas
Posted on X on October 11, 2024

This was in response to this:

Funny how anti-gunners make jokes about gun owners being all white men and then freak out when they see gun companies marketing toward people who aren’t white men

Rob Romano @2Aupdates
Posted on X October 11, 2024

Kamala Harris announcing she owns a gun is another data point in favor of this hypothesis. She and/or her handlers see the writing on the wall and have decided it is time to be less openly hostile to gun ownership.

We Can Line All Those Guys Up and Shoot ’em

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We can line all those guys up and shoot ’em. And they clearly don’t understand the way the world works.

Phillip Lowcock 
October 9, 2024

Via a post on X from Chuck Petras @Chuck_Petras.

Violence. It is their language. It is what they think they can do. It is what they do.

See also:

I find it “interesting” that in the video he clearly says, “… we can…”. But in the msn.com, Newsweek, cjonline.com, and ksnt.com articles they “quote” him as saying, “…we could…”. Other articles don’t provide any quotes at all. They just say “Lowcock made some remarks about some men.”

What bias in the mainstream media?

Perhaps you really can’t hate the media enough.

Arming Up

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There has been a surge in the number of liberal Americans owning a firearm, according to new gun ownership data from the University of Chicago’s NORC research group cited by The Wall Street Journal.

According to WSJ, a world that has long been the domain of the white conservative male is being adopted by a growing number of Democrats who are ditching their scruples and getting themselves down to the local gun store.

Given this growing trend, it is hardly surprising that presidential candidate Kamala Harris has repeatedly drawn attention to how she and her running mate Tim Walz are both gun owners.

thedailydigest.com
October 8, 2024
Is soaring gun ownership among Democrats linked to US political polarization? (msn.com)

In general, this is good for gun owner rights issues. The more gun owners the more votes we get against restrictive gun laws. That’s fine, but the question I have is, “Why now?”

This is one of the answers given in the article:

Michael Ciemnoczolowski, a dyed in the wool Democrat from Iowa, interviewed by the news outlet, said that he was anxious about various unsettling trends that included a rise in armed right-wing extremists.

This chimes with what Professor Deana Rohlinger, a sociology professor at Florida State University, said in Newsweek – that rising gun ownership amongst Democrats could well be linked to the increasing political polarization in the US.

“For some, a gun purchase may be the result of their read on how increased political tensions and divisiveness in the US might play out,” Rohlinger told the news site.

There are other suggested reasons. But I have to express my concern that a big component is those 10% of Americans who say they believe political violence is justified to prevent Trump from becoming president again.

My underground bunker in Idaho is not going to be ready in time.

Knowledge is Power

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Via a post on X from Chuck Petras @Chuck_Petras.

I suspect this may only work for very low-pressure cartridges such as .22 LR. And there may be some accuracy issues for the first few shots.

SCOTUS to Hear a New Gun Case

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There are lots of good cases for SCOTUS to review. I wish an “assault weapon” ban were on the docket and eventually, perhaps incidentally with the “assault weapon” case, get NFA thrown out. The serial number/home build guns issue is being heard and is almost certain to go our way. Eventually I can see the background checks being dropped and being able to order guns online without an FFL. After all, FFL’s are not part of our history and tradition of gun laws.

In the meantime, this is probably a higher priority case than any of the above, even if it is a distraction from the individual rights cases:

Supreme Court Agrees to Hear ‘Business-Crushing’ Gun Case (msn.com)

The United States Supreme Court will hear case about whether Mexico can sue Smith & Wesson Brands Inc. for facilitating sales to people connected with Mexico’s drug cartels.

On Friday, the justices agreed to hear Smith & Wesson’s case seeking to dismiss the lawsuit filed by the Mexican government. Mexico sued the gun maker and is asking for billions of dollars in damages and new gun-control measures. It’s the first suit by a national government against the gun industry, and one that Smith & Wesson warn could completely decimate their industry.

In a letter addressed to the Supreme Court clerk on August 8, a lawyer for Smith & Wesson Brands said the company is protected from a 2005 law that provides liability shields to gunmakers.

…

In the lawsuit, Mexico alleged the manufactures and distributors were helping the purchase of their firearms by dealers who were known to supply the drug cartels. It also is claimed that the companies did not make changes, such as installing safeguards or making gun serial numbers harder to tamper with, that could make the guns less likely for criminal use.

I have to wonder why former President Obama and former U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder are not named in the lawsuit. Holder was found to be in contempt of Congress for his actions in this case. They are the people that forced the gun dealers to sell guns to the Mexican cartels.

But I don’t wonder long. The likely reason is that Operation Fast and Furious was a ruse to generate a means to bring down gun dealers and manufacturers.

False Hope or a Neutered SCOTUS?

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A group of state legislators, local politicians and nonprofits on Tuesday launched a national coalition that hopes to circumvent the congressional stalemate on gun reform by pressing for violence prevention efforts at the local level.

The coalition, Legislators for Safer Communities, aims to capitalize on the shifting politics of gun reform by focusing more attention on state legislatures, where violence prevention advocates have scored their biggest wins in recent years.

Roque Planas
September 17, 2024
State Lawmakers Have Gun Reform Strategy | HuffPost Latest News

I have to wonder about something which is not mentioned, the courts. The really active gun owner rights groups are getting more done with fewer people and fewer dollars in the Federal courts than they can in the state legislatures. They don’t have to fight the same fights every year in every state.

Are the anti-gun people just trying to keep the money coming in by giving their supporters false hope? Or do they believe the Democrats are soon going to neuter SCOTUS and reverse our wins?

All Your Rights Violated, All the Time

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We’re going to require responsible behaviors among everybody in the community, and just because you legally possess a gun in the sanctity of your locked home doesn’t mean that we’re not going to walk into that home and check to see if you’re being responsible and safe in the way you conduct your affairs.

Kamala Harris
2007
Commentary: On the Second Amendment, Harris shoots herself in the foot — again (msn.com)

Using the 2nd Amendment as sort of a canary in the coalmine seems to work well. If they won’t respect the 2nd Amendment, why should you expect they will respect any other rights? And, of course, once they have sufficiently infringed upon the right to keep and bear arms you don’t have the means to effectively push back when they infringe all your rights all the time.

There Are Many Answers

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There is but one answer to be made to the dynamite bomb and that can best be made by the Winchester rifle.

Theodore Roosevelt
1887
Did Teddy Roosevelt Say the ‘One Answer to Terrorism’ Is a Winchester Rifle?

Via an email, which had “terrorism” instead of “the dynamite bomb” in the quote, from pkoning.

While it captures the appropriate sentiment succinctly, it is not all that accurate these days. It appears to me that Israel is doing rather well in their fight against the terrorists/dynamite-bombers in their neighborhoods while using few, and perhaps zero, Winchester rifles. As was reported in a briefing at work last week:

They compromised the supply chain and delivered pagers with explosives to Hezbollah leadership. They blew them up almost simultaneously. Hezbollah then went to walkie-talkies and those were blown up. When Hezbollah then assembled in a single building for face-to-face communication, they blew up the building.

This will be studied and admired for years to come as one of the most creative, complex, and well executed operations in the history of warfare.

Precision guided bombs, M-4s, M-16s, tanks, and hand grenades have been delivering some very authoritative answers as well.

Whatever you think of their religion, ethics, and/or political behavior, they have certainly demonstrated if you don’t respect them, you risk coming to fear them.

I hope gun owners don’t have to teach similar lessons to those who fail to respect us and our rights.

Specific Types of Government

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Via Chuck Petras @Chuck_Petras and Fight With Memes @fightwithmemes

Totally true.

A Specific Enumerated Right–VOID by Passing Hurricane

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Via a posts on X by Chuck Petras @Chuck_Petras and Bryan LaFonte
@bryanlafonte:·

There are few other situations where you would need defensive weapons more than when the social structure has been ripped apart. Either this is either mind boggling stupid or deliberate enabling of criminals.

I hope he enjoys his trial.