Category Archives: Gun Rights

A step in the right direction

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Via email from Rolf.

Thousands cleared by judge’s ruling will seek gun arrest damages

A decision by U.S. District Judge Royce C. Lamberth in another fight over guns created by the local government in Washington means it could be getting costly for taxpayers there.

It’s because the judge’s decision “has cleared the way for claims for damages by as many as 4,500 people” who were arrested under the now-defunct law against carrying handguns in public.

The problem was outlined by constitutional expert Jonathan Turley, who explained the specific case applies to six people, but the damages could be claimed by thousands.

“Those rising costs do not seem to register with the D.C. City Council,” he explained. “The city could appeal and argue that, at the time of the arrests, it was not clear that the underlying law was unconstitutional.”

Lamberth, however, already rejected that claim and ruled that the law was clearly unconstitutional when the city passed it.

The decision from Lamberth noted how D.C. effectively had “banned non-residents from possessing a firearm,” and prevented anyone “from carrying a weapon in public.”

It’s not a prosecution under 18 USC 242, but it’s a step in the right direction.

Quote of the day—Jim Bovard

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The FBI’s power and federal legitimacy are far more tenuous than Washington recognizes. Beyond the nation’s big cities and the coastlines, federal authority hinges largely on the consent of local citizens. Once that consent vanishes, FBI agents are left to sit in their cars eating their lunches all by themselves. But plenty of pundits and congressmen still clamor for the government to confiscate everyone’s guns or forcibly inject their children. If the feds came in and started shooting mountain men who refused to surrender their firearms, they would likely quickly find themselves in a worse plight than Custer at the Little Big Horn.

Jim Bovard
September 27, 2021
He Thought I Was an Undercover Fed
[Consent of the governed is a concept in our country’s founding documents. With a nearly $30 Trillion debt, incredible overreach of the U.S. Constitution’s limits, and blatant violation of our specific enumerated rights, it is long past time to revoke consent.—Joe]

Quote of the day—Kevin Sorbo @ksorbs

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We should have left our guns for the Australians not the taliban.

Kevin Sorbo @ksorbs
Tweeted on September 26, 2021
[I have nothing to add.—Joe]

First treated as the Second

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image

Via a tweet by JPFO.

Quote of the day—JPFO

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The tyranny of BATFE must end. It’s corrupt purpose is self-evident: You would never consider leading the Aviation Administration with people afraid to fly—you pick pilots, aircraft designers, industry leaders, so the industry can flourish. By proposing an agency head who hates the industry under its thumb, it’s obvious what feds seek—not protection of our property and rights.

By trying to put people in charge who detest America’s 120 million gun owners, the federal government shows its disdain for the Bill of Rights. Can you imagine if this industry that supplies us with arms and keeps us all safe had people in government they could trust? No? Of course not, all the more reason to scrap this unconstitutional gang of criminals. We do not need hostile anti-rights partisans associated with the ungun cabal like the Bradys, Giffords, Bloomberg astroturf Moms. That’s like asking landlubbers to be lifeguards.

JPFO
September 24, 2021
WHAT IS THE LOGIC OF HAVING A FEDERAL AGENCY LED BY PEOPLE WHO WANT THE INDUSTRY TO DIE?
[It is a rhetorical question. Of course everyone knows what the logic is.

This latest insult of nominating David Chipman as the head of the ATF should go in the evidence file to be used at their trials.—Joe]

Quote of the day—Brandon Smith

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Eventually tyranny has to put boots on the ground. A totalitarian system can function for a time on color of law and implied threats, but it will crumble unless it is able to establish a physical presence of force. Once those jackboots touch soil in a visible way and the agents of the state try to expand oppressive measures, rebels then have a free hand to disrupt them or bring them down. But this only works if there are objectives and enough decentralization to prevent misdirection of the movement.

Brandon Smith
September 22, 2021
Organizing Patriots In The Face Of Government Informants And False Flags
[Interesting post and associated comments.

See also my Boots on the ground blog post.—Joe]

Marge Greene should attend Boomershoot

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I hope she “triggers” all the right people:

Boomershoot appears to be a good match for her public persona.

Quote of the day—Kevin D. Williamson

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Gun control is not about gun crime — gun control is about gun culture.

…

That culture-war mentality produces a great deal of sloppy thinking and ignorant commentary. Consider the case of Gail Collins in Thursday’s New York Times. Collins is hopping mad about gun shows, about which she seems to know . . . not a whole lot. “Yeah,” she writes — really, “yeah” — “right now one easy way to buy a gun without having anyone check to see if you have a history of criminal convictions, mental illness or a domestic violence restraining order is to just plunk down some cash at a gun show.”

This is — and this part still matters! — not true.

…

Because this is a culture-war issue rather than a crime-reduction issue, Collins apparently has not bothered thinking much about the most obvious and most relevant question: Are guns bought at gun shows a significant contributor to crime?

Kevin D. Williamson
September 16, 2021
Gun-Control Laws Aren’t about Preventing Crimes
[The obvious and relevant questions are also inconvenient for people such as Collins. Other questions not mentioned by Williamson include, “Do you realize you are advocating for infringements on a specific enumerated right?” And, “Are you aware that conspiracy to infringe upon rights is a serious Federal crime?”

Perhaps such questions will come up at their trials.—Joe]

Complacency

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Via email:

I write once in a great while when something hits me that I think you might be interested in putting in the blog, or just doing research on…
today is one of those days.  Usually I comment on the blog as “The Patriarch”

22 years ago, my father passed (no, not 22 years ago today).  A veteran of WWII, he brought home a bunch of weapons – a couple of Mauser 8mm bolt action rifles, and a single shot .22, which was apparently used for training on the Mauser.

And  Walther P-38. Matching serial numbers, and holster (it was found with a German Medical officers uniform).

When he passed, I got the pistol, and one of the Mausers.  Having hit a few rough times financially, I decided that I’d offer the pistol to my brother.  My brother has been hunting and fishing and general outdoors kind of guy (more so than I am, sadly, for many reasons)  We struck a deal and he said “ship it to me”.  This should have been my first clue.

I informed him that the law won’t allow me to ship it directly to him, so unless he wanted to drive from MN to Seattle, he needed to find an FFL to transfer it through.  This apparently surprised him.  So he sends me the address of a dealer.  Then I explained to him that I needed a copy of their FFL (for the shipper to verify the address), and why.  I called them, and they promptly got my that.

Now it gets even more interesting.  The FFL is asking for *my* FFL, but it’s not required, when shipping from WA, to ship through an FFL< only TO an FFL… which they researched and agreed with me about.  So, I ship it to them.

My brother goes to pick it up – I offhandedly mentioned that he would need to fill out the 4473 and do the NICS … a couple hours later he texts me and says that they informed him that he needed a permit to purchase.  He was way upset because he is moving at the end of the month and it will take time to get this permit.

I told him I thought it was weird he needed a permit to purchase when he wasn’t actually purchasing, and that this was weird because I thought WA firearm laws were wacky…

I was biting my tongue because I wanted to go on a rant about voting and getting people in gov’t that would respect the 2nd amendment, etc… but he wasn’t in the right frame of mind.

I was just a bit surprised that he hadn’t done the research first.

Anyway, it would seem that there are a lot of owners out there that are a bit complacent.  Not aware of what is going on in the halls of government.

Use it or not.

“The Patriarch”

I fear far too many gun owners don’t have a sufficient clue as to what is going on in many of the states. I’ve essentially given up on the legislatures and am betting (with thousands of dollars in donations each year to SAF and FPC) on the courts to reverse the infringements.

Quote of the day—Zachary Faria

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The surge in new gun owners could have a political impact that lasts far longer than the pandemic and the surge in homicides that inspired it.

Between January 2019 and April 2021, approximately 7.5 million people became first-time gun owners. Nearly 50% of them were women. More than 40% are black or Latino. This is bad news for the gun control movement and, perhaps in the long term, for the Democratic Party.

…

Gun control, despite polling well as a collection of general platitudes, is already a losing issue throughout the country. Each time someone becomes a first-time gun owner, the chances of passing the strict gun control measures that the gun control movement and the majority of the Democratic Party want to see implemented go down. The pandemic will go away, and homicides will decline — but this will continue to shape our gun control politics for years to come.

Zachary Faria
September 17, 2021
The pandemic and the homicide surge will have a lasting effect on our gun control politics
[Help the trend to continue. Take a new shooter to the range.—Joe]

Quote of the day—Magus Melanie @MagusMelanie

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Small dick buys guns to feel masculine

Magus Melanie @MagusMelanie
Tweeted on August 13, 2021
[It’s another Markley’s Law Monday!

We have SCOTUS decisions. The best they can bring to the party are childish insults.—Joe]

Quote of the day—Leana S. Wen

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President Biden’s much-hyped new strategy for fighting covid-19 is a tepid half-measure that falls short of the dramatic reset the country needs. The six-pronged strategy announced on Thursday can be summarized as “more of the same” — these are good steps in the right direction, but they’re not enough to get the job done.

…

Biden needs to acknowledge that we have reached the end of the line when it comes to asking individuals to get vaccinated. We’ve tried education, incentives and appealing to people’s patriotic duty. It’s not working. Now is the time for mandates, with the federal government using the full extent of its authority.

Leana S. Wen
September 9, 2021
Biden’s six-step covid strategy does not go far enough to compel vaccinations
[As President Biden said:

This is not about freedom or personal choice.

Actually, it is about freedom and personal choice. And the lack of authority of the executive branch to create law without going through the legislative branch. And the lack of constitutionality authority for the Federal government to force the injection of foreign substances into individuals without consent.

In short, this action is clearly illegal. It violates 18 USC 242 and probably numerous other laws.

Of course, the courts may not see this as clearly as the rest of us.

If the President has this authority then he also has the authority to force the injection of an abortifacient, a birth control drug, implant fertilized eggs, or sterilize those deemed unfit to reproduce (see previous link). We are no longer considered individuals with inalienable rights. We are little different from cattle in their treatment (no pun intended) of us.

For decades I believed the most likely spark to start Civil War II would be something related to guns. I now think the insanity over forced vaccinations could nudge out gun control.—Joe]

Quote of the day—Baron Bodissey

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Initially, dictatorship is imposed via the abuse and manipulation of language, its function being to peddle falsehoods. Censorship comes next, and then the denigration and erasure of memories of the past. This process has an established pattern. First, the past is ridiculed. Second, it is demonised and, finally, criminalised.

It is when the first stage is segueing into the second that an open battle of wills begins to emerge between those demanding the reinstatement of their traditional culture, customs, and freedoms and the totalitarian few, gathered together with their imported alien foot soldiers, who are attempting to destroy everything that was and is.

At that point it soon becomes evident that the only viable end game is that one side must completely eliminate the other in order to survive. There is no longer any room, nor necessity, for the so often fatal trap of compromise.

Have no doubts about it: If the situation becomes kinetic, and history suggests this has a probability higher than 0.5, then only the brave, the most determined and ruthless will prevail.

Baron Bodissey
September 5, 2021
Crossing the Rubicon
[Interesting take on the current situation in Britain. I’m not sure Bodissey knows that much more on the topic than anyone else and I wonder how well it applies to the U.S.. But I can see some strong correlations to our situation.—Joe]

Quote of the day—Casey @All_Caps18

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I suppose the guns are how you soothe yourself over your other …shortcomings.

Casey @All_Caps18
Tweeted on September 3, 2021
[It’s another Markley’s Law Monday!

From the thread:

IfArgumentProGun
 Mega @Moogalah

Oh no, it’s the one and only joke anti gunners have. I will now kill myself because of how clever, original, and well thought out it was.

 Ishmael Antony Gatz @PlastikGatz

TheyAreArmedBecauseSmallPenises

Floridian80 @MLJohnson80

WhenGunGrabbersAreOutOfTalkingPoints

Jeremy Lowe @ConfiscateDeez

I cuddle mine at night and read them bedtime stories. I tell my 1911 all about his dad, John Browning. The slide then goes back and forth with happiness until it lowers it’s hammer down for the night and goes to bed. #GunsHaveFeelingsToo (Now that’s how you do something original)

Turbo Encabulator @blath4242

TinyVagina


CrCritical Race Theory is Racist @ESameoutcome

I have never heard of a group of guys that are so obsessed with the sizes of other men’s junk as the anti-gun pervs! Does one need to have an obsession with dicks to be anti-gun, or does being anti-gun cause that obsession?

Skip Bradley Flag of United States EagleCamera @LoneOwlImages

You would think they would be starting to catch on that we have heard the “small penis” insult before and get a clue. But, no, they are pretty much without a clue.—Joe]

Quote of the day—Cam Edwards

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The Third Circuit panel found that not only did the township offer no evidence that its zoning rules are targeted to achieve a public safety benefit without imposing undue restrictions on the right to keep and bear arms, but that it neglected to explain why it chose to implement these specific restrictions, and why they did so only in the part of the township that was zoned for “sportsmen’s clubs.” Two other areas of town where “shooting ranges” are allowed to operate don’t have these same types of restrictions in place, but the township can’t explain why center-fire rifle firing should be banned at a sportsmen’s club and not at a shooting range.


Now the case goes back down to the district court for a third time, and hopefully this time around the judge makes the correct decision and finds that the township violated the rights of the gun range owner by arbitrarily imposing these zoning restrictions without being able to offer up any substantive reason for doing so.

Cam Edwards
August 17, 2021
Second Amendment In Gun Range Case

A good start

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There have been over 400,000,000 guns sold in the U.S. since November 1998.

Quote of the day—David Frum

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You want to be a protective spouse, a concerned parent, a good citizen, a patriotic American? Save your family and your community from danger by getting rid of your weapons, and especially your handguns. Don’t wait for the law. Do it yourself; do it now. Do it because you just bought your first home, do it because you just got married, do it because you just had the baby you cherish more than anything in this world. The gun you trust against your fears is itself the thing you should fear. The gun is a lie.

As more Americans recognize the lie, they may notice a powerful new possibility. Once emancipated from the false myth of the home-protecting gun, they will find it easier to write laws and adopt policies to stop the criminals and zealots who carry guns into the streets. Win enough elections, and the federal courts will retreat from their sudden gun advocacy—and return to their historic deference to state regulation of firearms.

David Frum
September 1, 2021
How to Persuade Americans to Give Up Their Guns
[Frum needs to review the 2nd Amendment and the Heller decision.

Then he needs to read some books on the risk of not owning firearms and the ethics of restricting firearms ownership. I would like to suggest:

Then, if he is still in the persuasive mood, I’d be glad to introduce him to the power of the word “No.” backed up by 100 million determined gun owners with their own means of persuasion.—Joe]

Quote of the day—Shannon Watts

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Data shows that visible guns makes people more aggressive, so it’s a logical next step to believe that open carry makes it more likely that disagreements will turn into violent conflicts.

Shannon Watts
Founder of Moms Demand Action
September 1, 2021
TEXANS CAN NOW OPENLY CARRY GUNS IN PUBLIC WITHOUT A PERMIT OR TRAINING. POLICE SAY THE NEW LAW MAKES IT HARDER TO DO THEIR JOBS
[Interesting. I wonder what invisible guns make people do.

Watts knows open carry does not make it more likely that disagreements will turn violent. She is planting the idea in a effort to persuade the public it is acceptable to infringe upon the specific enumerated right to keep and bear arms. And, of course, she completely ignores the existence of the 2nd Amendment.

I would also bet that any data she has indicating “visible guns makes people more aggressive” is the result of cherry picking the data and probably presuming causality and ignoring other factors which account for any change in perceived aggressiveness.

Lies and deception, it is what anti-gun people do.—Joe]

Quote of the day—Gregory Hoyt

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It’s certainly a bold ask, as the groups attached to this letter are blatantly requesting that Democrats not only have a monopoly on gun legislation, but to adopt a hardline position of legislating away at gun rights while also urging the public to relinquish said rights through persuasion via the bully pulpit.

Gregory Hoyt
August 29, 2021
Here it comes: Gun control groups pressure Biden to create firearm control office to bypass Senate
[Bold? Perhaps. Especially with President Biden is completely overwhelmed by other issues. But if gets even a little publicity and traction in leftist media it will move the Overton Window in the wrong direction.

Do your part to combat the continuing battle for mindshare.

  • Come out of the closet as a gun owner.
  • Take a newbie to the range.
  • Get concealed carry licenses in many states (the numbers are frequently published and numbers matter).
  • Responsibly carry when you can.
  • Donate to organizations which support the Second Amendment (I donate thousands each year to SAF and FPC).

The Biden administration, deliberately or not, appears to be destroying the United States of America. Some of the individual states with low debt and a strong mindset of liberty appear to be the best hope for the future. Perhaps it is time to let the U.S. collapse.—Joe]

Quote of the day—Joey (@Joey13251)

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I think the males who don’t want to get vaccinated are already in the wet noodle phase.
It’s why they need to walk around with so many guns.

Joey (@Joey13251)
Tweeted on July 31, 2021
[It’s another Markley’s Law Monday!

Oh! It’s a twofer! Their childish insults and prejudice includes people skeptical of experimental vaccines as well gun owners.

Remember, childish insults are what you use with you can not think of anything better.—Joe]