And another thing that made me angry

Thinking back to the dark ages of the ‘94 Assault Weapon ban today reminded me of some other things that upset me at the time. There were numerous court challenges to the law. One of the most frustrating things about the disposition of these cases were that the government would say, in essence, “We haven’t prosecuted anyone under this law so you don’t have standing to challenge it.” I recall (but cannot find a quote) Attorney General Janet “Butcher of Waco” Reno saying that they had no intent of enforcing the law either. Hence the courts dismissed the challenges. Here is one such case.

My interpretation of it was that this they knew they would lose in court and were deliberately preventing us from proving they had overstepped their Constitutional limits.

They lie. They can’t help themselves

Over at Sebastian’s he talks about the distortion of the language by the anti-gun people. In specific the attempt to change the meaning of the phrase “well regulated militia” from “well functioning” to “government regulated”. And how it upset him when he found out about it:

I went through most of the Clinton years not understanding how the Assault Weapons Ban was even remotely constitutional, and wondering why nothing was done about it. When I found out, I became angry.

It was just a few minutes ago when I was having lunch with Barb L. I told her about Speaker of the House Tom Foley losing his seat over the AWB. At about that same time she was a Washington State lobbyist and generally pretty plugged into Washington State politics. But she didn’t understand how he lost his seat.

I explained it was because of the AWB and there were two things that really, really pissed us off above and beyond the ban itself.

One was they called the ban “Public Safety and Recreational Firearms Use Protection Act”. It’s a firearms use protection act that bans guns? They lie. It’s what they do. They can’t help themselves.

And the other was that Foley kept the voting open for several minutes after the stated voting period had expired. The bill failed but by keeping the voting open they got people to change their votes until they had enough for passage. He then closed the voting. The video of him doing that was incredible propaganda for the pro-gun side during his election that fall. Foley became the first sitting Speaker of the House to lose his bid for re-election since Galusha Grow in 1862.

If the gun owners his district in Eastern Washington could have gotten away with it I’m sure you could have sold thousands of tickets to use a horse whip on him.

Russian commentators on U.S. gun rights

Russian political commentators seem to have a better handle on some aspects of U.S. politics and human psychology in general than do U.S. commentators:

Who is stronger, the gun lobby or the president? The answer is – of course, the gun lobby.

Obama came up with his gun violence reduction plan after last year’s mass shooting drama in a Connecticut primary school. Immediately, gun sales shot up. Leading US firearms manufacturers – Ruger, Smith&Wesson, and Remignton – reported a 40-50 sales increase. So, Obama virtually did his opponents from the National Rifle Association (NRA) a big favor, said Valery Garbuzov, deputy head of the Institute for US and Canadian Studies in Moscow.

“Whenever people learn that there might soon be a shortage of some goods or other, they rush to buy things they would never have bought under usual circumstances. That same with guns. Obama’s plan triggered an adverse reaction. I think that it was a poorly calculated move,” he told the Voice of Russia.

My first gun was purchased because of President Clinton and the impending “Assault Weapon Ban” of 1994. Numerous other people I know became gun owners for almost identical reasons. Obama is a better gun salesman than Clinton. We’ll be reaping the rewards from Obama’s efforts to ban guns for at least a decade.

Which U.S. political commentators are talking about this? Our opponents just keep urging the politicians to, indirectly, sell more guns. The more gun owners there are the more firmly entrenched the right to keep and bear arms becomes.

This is what they think of you

Via a Tweet from Linoge:

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After you grasp the fact that this person regards gun owners as “murderers who hate children” think about what the next step is. What is the normal disposition of “murderers who hate children”?

My conclusion is that this person wants people who exercise the specific enumerated right to keep and bear arm in prison or executed. And just what does someone like this think of people who defend Second Amendment? My speculation is they are hostile to the First, Fourth, and Fifth Amendments as well as the Second.

These are very, very dangerous people.

Update: Linoge emailed me more tweets from this person. Imagine if they were saying these things about blacks, Jews, or gays. It reinforces my conclusion that these are very dangerous people.

lougagliardicompromise1

lougagliardicompromise3

lougagliardicompromise4

lougagliardijustifiedhomicide1

lougagliardijustifiedhomicide2

lougagliardilibertarian

lougagliardireligion

lougagliardireligion2

lougagliardiwantpeopletodie

lougagliardiyoukilledthosechildren

Gun cartoon of the day

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It’s a Markley’s Law Monday gun cartoon!

The real message of course is the same as if blacks, gays, women, or some other minority showed up to a “presidential event”. Gun owners are a minority and need to get out of the political closet and show their numbers. That this cartoonist thought it was appropriate to say something like this just shows what a prejudiced bigot he is.

Via an email from Weer’d Beard who sometimes follows Baldr Odinson.

Quote of the day—Nick Armer

I was wondering if you’re obsessed with guns because they make up for what your dick lacks you limp dick piece of shit

Nick Armer
Email to Connecticut Carry on May 9, 2013.
[It’s another Markley’s Law Monday!—Joe]

Quote of the day—Emily Miller

The entire public discussion of gun control issues today is dominated today by terms created by the people who want to chip away at Americans Second Amendment rights. Anti-gun activists invented these phrases:

  • Assault weapons
  • High capacity magazines
  • Cop killer bullets
  • Universal background checks
  • The gun show loophole
  • High power ammunition

Not one of these terms actually means what President Obama, Mayor Bloomberg, and their allies mean to suggest by it. Rhetorical deception is the key component in the push for more gun control laws.

Emily Miller
2013
Emily Gets Her Gun: …But Obama Wants to Take Yours
[In other words, they know they cannot win unless they use deception.

If you ignore the adrenaline dumps and the blood pressure spikes this is a very, very good book. It’s easy to read and very informative. Even though I have been involved in the fight for nearly 20 years I still learned things from it. Read it and encourage your friends to read it.—Joe]

Random thought of the day

After President Obama set the precedent with not enforcing the individual mandate and the discussion I had with Ry the other day I thought back to some of the other things he has done along the same line. The rule, in direct violation of Federal law, about reporting long guns sales to the ATF is one example. The selling of thousands of guns to people known to be ineligible to posses them who were delivering them to the Mexican drug cartels is another. And failure to prosecute officials in D.C., New Jersey, Chicago, and New York, etc. for infringing upon the specific enumerated right to keep and bear arm in general.

I was then anticipating the sweet, sweet pleasure of the screams of the anti-gunners at some time in the future. I was imagining that we get an extraordinarily very pro-gun president in office and, just like President Obama, he say you don’t have to pay a particular tax for the next year. The $200 transfer tax on suppressors, destructive devices, and machine guns would be at the top of the list. Form 4473’s are a burden, people affected don’t like them, so don’t worry about them. And, oh, by the way, we won’t be enforcing the NFA 34 registry or Hughes Amendment for the next year either.

At the end of the year, machine guns, suppressors, short barreled rifles, short barreled shotguns, and destructive devices would be so widespread they would be considered, “in common use” and therefore protected by even a strict reading of the Heller decision.

The tears of the anti-gun people would be so plentiful we would collect them, put them in empty pop cans and sell them as reactive targets. Life would be good.

Then I had another thought. Obama also is not punishing the IRS for oppression of organizations opposed to his political party. Nor has he done anything about the NSA spying on everyone. And now the judges being appointed don’t need the support of even a single person in the minority party of the Senate. What justification do I have for even having a wild fantasy about something like that? What justification do I have to imagine the socialists will ever lose control of the Whitehouse? Or after the next election even either house of Congress?

The reality is that I need to put more effort into Plan B.

My next shipment from Dillon Precision arrives on Monday:

DillonPackage

Quote of the day—Myrddin

Gun control advocates have offered capitulation couched as ‘reasonable demands’ for far too long. If the pro-gun lobby is going to resist any significant restriction on guns, then we should put on the table the very thing they fear most.

We need to start far more drastic measures if we are going to save our children and ourselves.

It is far past time to call for a total ban on guns.

Myrddin
December 14, 2012
Forget the assault weapons ban, it’s time to ban guns completely
[Myrddin has no sense of political, physical, or criminological reality.

With our enemies that out of touch it’s no wonder we are winning.—Joe]

Higher rates than entire countries

In addition to being extremely ignorant about guns many anti-gun people have no clue about math:

Some U.S. cities have higher gun murder rates than entire countries.

I find it amazing someone can pack so much stupid into a single sentence.

First off “gun murders” are an extremely biased measure of crime. It presumes that murders by various method are independent of each other. They are not. Substitution of weapons are well known to criminologist who study these things. If it were possible to eliminating firearms from society the murder rate would not be reduced by an amount corresponding to the number “gun murders” prior to the flying unicorns carrying off with all firearms.

Furthermore, firearms are far more frequently used as defensive tools than as offensive weapons. Any law which hopes to decrease their use as an offensive tool must be carefully crafted and enforced such that it does not decrease the availability and use as a defensive tool more than it does as an offensive tool. To the best of my knowledge no such law has ever existed. Hence infringing upon the right to keep and bear arms, no matter how insignificantly, actually runs a strong risk of contributing to increases violent crime.

Second, saying someplace has a higher rate of anything than entire country only demonstrates how stupid the person is. If someone lives alone and commits suicide that household has a 100% suicide rate. This is a higher rate than every city, county, and country on the planet. If Tom McKay, who wrote the article, thinks his statement is of any significance whatsoever beyond making scary sounding noises he truly has crap for brains.

Quote of the day—Jack Lessenberry

Nobody needs to have a handgun in America.

Nobody needs to have guns in their home, period.

That should be the starting point for any discussion about gun control in our insanely murderous society.

Jack Lessenberry
December 19, 2012
Ban all guns, now. Nobody needs to have a handgun in America — period
[“Insanely murderous society?” Citation needed.

No Jack, there are couple of other starting points in the discussion. 1) The Bill of Rights guarantees the pre-existing right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed. And probably most importantly; 2) When the collections start are you going to be taking point? There will be lots of openings for that position. There will not be a lot of opportunities for retirement but you can count on getting your 15 minutes of fame early, as well as late, in your career.—Joe]

Quote of the day—Jim Rosapepe

I’m glad the people of the 21st District support my efforts to get assault weapons off Maryland streets once and for all.

Jim Rosapepe
November 11, 2006
Maryland State Senator
Advocates for Assault Weapons Ban Sweep Close Contests in Maryland
[Don’t ever let someone get away with telling you no one wants to take your guns.—Joe]

Quote of the day—New York Times

One way to discourage the gun culture is to remove the guns from the hands and shoulders of people who are not in the law enforcement business.

New York Times
September 24, 1975
The Gun Culture
[“Discourage” the gun culture?

I don’t think “discouragement” would be the response. The New York Times was, and still is, quite out of touch with reality.—Joe]

Quote of the day—Stephen J. Solarz

Mr. speaker, we must take swift and strong action if we are to rescue the next generation from the rising of tide armed violence. That is why today I am introducing the Handgun Control Act of 1992. This legislation would outlaw the possession, importation, transfer or manufacture of a handgun except for use by public agencies, individuals who can demonstrate to their local police chief that they need a gun because of threat to their life or the life of a family member, licensed guard services, licensed pistol clubs which keep the weapons securely on premises, licensed manufacturers and licensed gun dealers.

The time has come for the Congress to place reasonable controls on handguns. I urge my colleagues to join me in supporting the Handgun Control Act of 1992.

Rep. Stephen J. Solarz, New York
August 12, 1992
Congressional Record, 102nd Congress, 1991-1992, Daily Edition, Pages E2492-2493.
[Those were dark days when “reasonable controls” were a ban on an entire class of firearm.—Joe]

Lawsuit against the innocent continues while the guilty go free

The ATF and Federal prosecutors responsible for Fast and Furious have been removed from the lawsuit by Agent Brian Terry’s survivors:

A judge has dismissed federal employees from a wrongful death lawsuit filed by the family of a slain Border Patrol agent over the botched “Fast and Furious” gun operation, noting congressionally-mandated remedies are already in place for when an agent dies in the line of duty.

But the judge let stand the lawsuit against the gun dealer:

Attorneys for the Terry family said they will appeal the judge’s ruling and will continue to pursue the lawsuit against the remaining defendant, Lone Wolf Trading Co., where the gun found at the shootout scene was purchased.

The gun dealers involved in Fast and Furious were told by the ATF they should let the sales of guns to known felons go through. The gun dealers objected but cooperated anyway.

What were the gun shops going to do? Tell their regulators to “shove it”? The ATF would have been “auditing” them, refusing to tell them what they had done wrong, with plausible threats of stomping kittens to death, destroying evidence, falsely telling the court you been convicted of robbing banks, entrapping you, and falsely claiming you ran a meth lab.

This is an incredible injustice. AG Holder and everyone that contributed to the decisions for this belong in jail.

Decent article on Alan Gottlieb

I’ve seen a number of hit pieces on Alan Gottlieb in the mainstream media. But this is a decent article from the Seattle Times.

H/T to Anette Wachter.

Random thought of the day

If carrying a gun is counter productive because the bad guy will just take it away from you and use it against you then you don’t have anything to worry about with bad guys having guns. This is because you can just take the gun away from them and use it against them.

If you then don’t have anything to fear from the bad guys having guns then there is no problem with good guys carrying guns. Therefore there shouldn’t be any laws restricting gun ownership or carrying in public.

Anti-gun logic fails again.

Quote of the day—sabatia

Guys who need guns to impress typically are smalley endowed and afraid to be alone with themselves and their “things.” Big gun=Scaredy cat. Big gun=Little thing.

sabatia
November 11, 2013
Comment to Texas gun advocates just “posing for a photo” in public–with rifles.
[It’s another Markley’s Law Monday!—Joe]

Quote of the day—Violence Policy Center

Firearms are currently exempt from the health and safety laws that apply to every other consumer product in America, from toasters to teddy bears. Applying those same standards to guns is the real key to reducing firearm death and injury in America. Under these standards, handguns would be banned because of their high risk and low utility.

Violence Policy Center
Cited March 16, 1999 by GunCite
The False Hope of the Smart Gun
[I find it interesting that the 2013 version of this paper has removed the last sentence of the above paragraph.—Joe]

When will they issue tags?

I just finished Emily Gets Her Gun: …But Obama Wants to Take Yours.

I had sort of followed her Washington Times series and hadn’t really planned on getting the book. I was sort of tempted when she won an award at the Gun Rights Policy Conference:

EmilyAlan

Finally I gave in and purchased the audible version so I could listen to it while driving. I’m not sure I should be driving when read it though. It generated a lot of adrenaline.

My thoughts on the book are that I’m going to do my best to avoid going to D.C. until you can get hunting tags for D.C. politicians and police.

The book should have a stronger title. Something like “The Most Dangerous City in the Nation is a Police State”. Or maybe “In D.C. Only Criminals and Cops Have Guns and You Can’t Distinguish Between Them.”

It is really, really bad in D.C. The roadblocks they put up to prevent you from getting or using a gun are bad enough. I knew about them and sort of accepted that is the way it is going to be until the Federal courts slap them down. But they way they treat gun owners even if you are within the law is criminal. The police have literally told gun owners, “I don’t have time for Constitutional B.S.” It’s not just the 2nd Amendment they despise. The ignoring of the 4th Amendment and due process is standard operating procedure.

The politicians and police committing these crimes cannot believe they are innocent of wrongdoing or protecting the innocent. Their actions are so atrocious that I’m serious when I say there should be hunting tags issued for them.

It will never happen you say? Hmmm…

Times change.

How long was it from the time Saddam Hussein, his sons, and thugs were comfortable in their position of power in Iraq until they had “dead or alive” bounties on their heads? Maybe a year or two at most?

How long was it from the time Mussolini, Hitler, and their thugs were in comfortable positions power until they were hunted? Maybe a couple of years. And Hitler’s thugs were hunted for several decades after their crimes.

How long was it from the time Nicolae Ceauşescu and his thugs were comfortably in power until they were being hunted? If you are generous it was about two weeks.

I have to conclude that when the government is a police state things can change extremely rapidly. It just might be possible there will come a time, within my lifetime, when people will be able to get hunting tags for the thugs in D.C.