These Repubs need to learn to differentiate between their guns and their Dick S. Serious. Too much of their identities is wrapped up in this. It’s silly.
Siara
February 4, 2013
Comment to Assault Weapons Ban Likely To Die So That Broader Gun Policy Legislation Can Live
[It’s another Markley’s Law Monday!—Joe]
The Chicago contingent is in a predicament that would be uncomfortable and embarrassing for lawmakers in any state west of the Mississippi, considering the homicide rate their city suffers … under the current regime. But they are the Chicago contingent, and they seem immune to embarrassment and discomfort while the bodies pile up.
Dave Workman
May 29, 2013
Clock ticking on Illinois carry effort
[I have nothing to add.—Joe]
Whatever the case some kind of concealed carry will come to Illinois. Some believed it would never happen. Many of our good members have passed away waiting for concealed carry to come to Illinois. I was thinking about them today. I could see their faces but I have to tell you I could not remember all their names. We should all be grateful for their efforts and remember that freedom comes at a dear price. In any case, I hope they are looking down on us and see that concealed carry come to Illinois. I also wonder, not just today, but often, how many lives were wasted because we did not have concealed carry in Illinois. I hope those people are looking down on us and are comforted by knowing many lives will be saved and others will not have to suffer the untimely death they suffered.
I also remember the endless string of enemies we have faced in our quest for concealed carry and our seemingly endless efforts to preserve the Second Amendment in Illinois. Many of those enemies will see Illinois get concealed carry first hand.
Many of our enemies have passed away also. I hope they are looking up and see concealed carry come to Illinois.
Richard Pearson
May 30, 2013
ISRA Thursday Bulletin
[H/T to Michael B. via email.—Joe]
The theory of collectivism relies on the unsteady moral conscience of leadership. Capitalism rests only on the material desire for more. The former requiring more virtue than the latter, it would be wiser to put one’s faith in that which does not demand the all-knowing hubris of central planners.
James E. Miller
May 27, 2013
Government and Collapsed Bridges
[I have nothing to add.–Joe]
The video posted here reminded me of something important.
This lept out at me like a cat with firecrackers exploding at its feet;
“The question is…how do we prevent people from committing crimes in the first place.”
No it isn’t. NO IT ISN’T!
The question IS; how do we protect liberty and dispense justice equally and reliably? The concept of crime prevention doesn’t even belong in the conversation, that is, if we’re talking about legislation, which we are.
How many people understand this? It’s there in that pledge, thingy; “…with liberty and justice for all.” Note the absence of any mention of crime prevention in the Pledge. You don’t find it in the declaration of Independence either, unless by “crime” we mean government overreach (in THAT case it’s in there, and I’m all ears if we’re having a conversation about preventing government overreach).
You can in theory have liberty and justice, OR you can have “crime prevention” legislation, but they cannot exist simultaneously. They’re mutually exclusive. The former defines a free state and the latter a police state.
The term “liberty and justice for all” takes crime as a given, a fact of life (if there’s no crime, there’s no need for a justice system). It’s an acknowledgement of the obvious – that people can do bad things. Because people can do bad things, we need our liberty protected and we demand justice. The term enshrines our right to self defense, free speech and all the rest, and promises a system of correct, organized, consistent and predictable retaliation (justice) for criminal acts.
I don’t think this is widely understood anymore. It certainly isn’t taught, and yet it is at the core of American Principle. Liberty and justice are two sides of the same coin. Crime prevention legislation is an entirely different coin, of a currency we want nothing to do with. I could say this a thousand different ways, but who gets it?
No, Little Grasshopper; crime prevention is the excuse of every police state. Having your rights respected and protected and having a proper justice system is the best condition of government you could ever ask. The prevention part is a combination of individual self defense and moral leadership, and neither of those are government business. That’s your job as a citizen. Crime prevention is your job. If it could be done with government force, (and all the worst places you can think of) would be crime free.
Via Guns Save Life we have this poll result from England:
Vote now: which bill would you like to see introduced in the Commons?
Total Votes: 9,726
It would be nice to have a scientific poll on the topic. Certain events can and do rapidly change the political climate. It could be the mindset of the subjects have changed because of the brutal murder of a soldier while bystanders watched and took pictures. You would have thought the steady rise in crimes committed with guns in England and Wales (from 2009) would have been sufficient:
The latest Government figures show that the total number of firearm offences in England and Wales has increased from 5,209 in 1998/99 to 9,865 last year – a rise of 89 per cent.
In some parts of the country, the number of offences has increased more than five-fold.
In eighteen police areas, gun crime at least doubled.
…
Only four police forces – Cleveland-Humberside, Cambridgeshire and Sussex – recorded falls in gun crime.
But clearly it wasn’t. We should encourage them and provide examples of how to develop a healthy gun culture. Perhaps we can speed up the recovery of their sick culture which disarms and punishes victims and enables predators.
Sometimes people take a long time to grasp reality but that doesn’t mean reality doesn’t grasp them immediately.
The National Rifle Association’s position and concerns will be made very clear when we file our lawsuit.
Alexa Fritts
Spokeswoman for the NRA’s Institute for Legislative Action
May 15, 2013
Signing of Md. gun control bill to launch new legal battles, fight for public support
[This same quote is also attributed to “Jacqueline Otto”. It is possible that it was written by someone else or even a committee. But still, I like it.—Joe]
Is it true that a man who needs an assault weapon to feel like a man is just compensating for the lack of something else? You know what I mean guys.
deeambro
February 4, 2013
Comment to Assault Weapons Ban Likely To Die So That Broader Gun Policy Legislation Can Live
[It’s another Markley’s Law Monday!—Joe]
…and of mass killings, and most wars.
It has been the thesis on this blog that disarmament has lead to more death by violence than any other single factor. I submit that such an assertion misses a critical point.
This is hard to put into words. Criminals, evil, exists everywhere and in all times. What separates times of relative peace from times of chaos and mass death then? I submit that it is resolve. A state of mind.
Tam recently spoke of a seeming dichotomy between Europe’s tendency toward docility or complacency and Her capacity for mass killing on a grand scale. I say that they are the same thing.
The willingness to go along to get along, the fear of making waves, the unwillingness to stand up and draw a line in the sand, and more importantly the lack of understanding or embracing of basic principles…together, THAT is the cause of chaos and mass death. Disarmament, while critical to the end of mass killing, and being a virtual guarantee of it, is but a symptom of that cause. The criminal element need but wait for the time to strike, meanwhile preaching peace at the cost of freedom. That includes the criminal element that always lurks in the halls and offices of government.
How else do you explain a thousand Jews guarded by a pathetic few Germans, while no one organizes a rush against the guards to easily overpower them? It wasn’t merely the lack of arms, but the lack of hutzpah THAT RESULTED iN the lack of arms. This is currently the state of all of Europe, the UK, and it’s becoming the case in the U.S.
I recently heard a phrase that will stay with me for the rest of my life. “The most powerful weapon of the oppressor is the the mind of the oppressed.” — David Masters quoting Stephen Banta
Intimidation is in the mind of the intimidated, not in the mind or the hands of the bully. Guns are only a factor in the hands of those who aren’t easily intimidated. For the easily intimidated, guns are pretty well worthless. Discuss.
Later we can talk about who’s the more easily intimidated, the self sufficient individual or the desk jokey politician with a team of interns.
The measure would repeal Chicago’s assault weapons ban and put public safety at risk.
Brooke Anderson
Spokesman for Illinois Governor Pat Quinn.
May 23, 2013
Quinn skeptical of Ill. House concealed-carry plan
[So tell me where is the murder rate higher? Is it in cities that don’t have a “assault weapons” ban like Seattle, Dallas, or Miami? Or is in Chicago?
I suppose it does depend upon your definition of “public”. My guess is that Anderson and Quinn are concerned with the safety of their primary constituents—the criminal elements of Chicago. And that includes those holding government office.—Joe]
It’s obvious that classic American liberalism is dead. It has morphed into a radical leftism which has found its standard bearer in Barack Hussein Obama, a rigid, cold-blooded leftist whose end-game is the complete dominance of American politics by a single political party. This is to be achieved using classic Socialist* tactics: making a majority of citizens dependent upon the state, either through jobs (shuffling paper, torturing fellow citizens with endless rules and regulations) or through welfare (redefined as a human right).
The revelations of political repression by the IRS against Conservatives should send chills up the spines of every American. For this is how tyrannies gain traction.
And under Obamacare, the IRS will have even more power.
…
*Socialist: noun \ˈsō-sh(ə-)list\— a Communist who has not yet picked up an AK47.
Robert J. Avrech
May 13, 2013
It Can’t Happen Here
[Not only can it happen here. It is happening here. People who have lived in “those other places” are experiencing déjà vu and we need to undo the damage done.—Joe]
The President and his advisors are behind calculated and concerted efforts to use the power of the Executive Branch to intimidate and silence their political opponents. Or the Federal Government is populated with rogue civil servants who abuse their authority coincidentally in support of the President and his Party’s agenda and the President and his advisors are powerless to stop them.
sandbagger
May 16, 2013
Comment to Words That Should Not Be Strung Together In America, “IRS Building Largest Government Database”
[I suppose there is at least one third option; the Executive Branch quietly rewards those that do it’s dirty work while maintaining plausible deniability.
In any case I can’t think of any options that are very flattering to the integrity of the Obama administration.
There are more than one way to deal with this as someone opposed to the current administration. One is to let them remain in power and exploit their weakness like what Sebastian is saying. Another would be to try and remove them from power. I’m not sure which would be best. “President Biden” does not have a pleasant ring to it but having Obama impeached would be satisfying. I’m just not sure the rewards are worth the effort. A “radioactive” Obama may be better long term than “cleaning house” when you can’t purge the site of the entire toxic waste pit until 2016 anyway.—Joe]
There seems to be some surprise and indignation at the idea that the IRS would be used as a weapon against political opponents. I don’t understand.
First; what did you expect from a communist administration? Really. Can you say, “DUUUH!”? Second; the entire tax code is a weapon of political power. Always has been. It is designed to nudge you into behaviors you’d not be engaged in if you were left to your own devices, and to nudge you out of other behaviors. The very concept of a progressive tax is a political weapon, designed to substantially reduce wealth creation and accumulation. Raising revenue is far down the list, or it is only an ancillary function of the tax code and the IRS. I could on and on, but you should have gotten the point by the time you received your very first paycheck.
The specific targeting of individuals and groups is nothing new at all either. The Clintons were famous for it. Rush Limbaugh has been getting audited every year for many years. The list is longer than this whole blog since its beginning.
A “Gosh, we’re sorry” will change nothing. The only solution, assuming anyone wants one, is to abolish the tax code, abolish the IRS and go to a single digit flat tax. Otherwise quit your bitching– this is exactly what you’ve been asking for. Begging for, actually. Don’t bother pretending to be surprised– it makes you look even more stupid.
We needed a bill that was going to confiscate, confiscate, confiscate.
Sandra Cunningham
New Jersey State Senator
May 9, 2013
[H/T Sebastian who said,
You know what would help prevent gun owners from always being paranoid that gun control activists and politicians were after their guns? Not actually being after our guns.
There is a reason why I have conditions whereby I might be persuaded to visit New Jersey.—Joe]
After looking at the letters you pointed to I would recommend that you take down any files you have posted and let the commodity jurisdiction request process take its course.
My Lawyer (who wishes to remain anonymous)
May 9, 2013
In regards to the files linked to in this post.
[It’s an interesting state of affairs when lawyers don’t want it to be known they are involved.—Joe]
I spent some time investigating ITAR in regards to the files for 3-D printing of weapons. It’s interesting stuff. The implications are huge.
I am not a lawyer although one or more of my sources for this post are. But none claim expertise in this area because it is such a specialized field. One source did claim “I know something about this”. The following may be a too broad interpretation of the law and the legal experts in the field will have to give us a more factual read.
The U.S. Department of State Directorate of Defense Trade Controls is the agency we have concerns about. Their mission is stated as:
The U.S. Government views the sale, export, and re-transfer of defense articles and defense services as an integral part of safeguarding U.S. national security and furthering U.S. foreign policy objectives. The Directorate of Defense Trade Controls (DDTC), in accordance with 22 U.S.C. 2778-2780 of the Arms Export Control Act (AECA) and the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR) (22 CFR Parts 120-130), is charged with controlling the export and temporary import of defense articles and defense services covered by the United States Munitions List (USML).
The documents of particular interest in figuring out the implications appear to be these two:
One of my sources ran up against ITAR due to being an NRA Firearms instructor. The NRA recently sent out a notice to instructors telling them not to provide training to foreign students. This is because, according to the first document above:
§ 120.9 Defense service.
(a) Defense service means:
(1) The furnishing of assistance (including
training) to foreign persons,
whether in the United States or abroad
in the design, development, engineering,
manufacture, production, assembly,
testing, repair, maintenance,
modification, operation, demilitarization,
destruction, processing or use of
defense articles;
(2) The furnishing to foreign persons
of any technical data controlled under
this subchapter (see § 120.10), whether
in the United States or abroad; or
(3) Military training of foreign units
and forces, regular and irregular, including
formal or informal instruction
of foreign persons in the United States
or abroad or by correspondence
courses, technical, educational, or information
publications and media of
all kinds, training aid, orientation,
training exercise, and military advice.
(See also § 124.1.)
In the last few months the Department of State is taking a much broader interpretation of this and other sections of U.S. code and applying it to gun owners, manufacturers, and instructors. There are two hypotheses for the change. One is that John Kerry is driving the change. The other is that is part of what Obama was talking about when he said he was working on gun control “under the radar”. The failure to get any gun control through Congress could have inflamed him enough that he sent out the word to find ways to punish us for our success in blocking him.
The law was intended to apply to people selling and providing real militarily useful products and training to our Cold War enemies. Things like night vision equipment and training on tank warfare or repairing high performance jet engines were valid things to be concerned about. And even though rifles that were particularly well suited for winning NRA High Power competition and training for doing better at USPSA matches could have military application the people at the Department of State ignored that. They were concerned with the nation states of the world that declared us their enemies rather than the “right-wing NRA domestic terrorists” who taught Home Firearm Safety classes a few times a year.
The law was written before the Internet and personal computers existed and some of the concepts that made sense then are absurd now. In the mid ‘90s we had the battle over encryption technology being declared an export restricted munitions. This was ultimately decided in favor of freedom under the First Amendment (the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in the Bernstein case and the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals in the Junger case). I don’t see why the present issue wouldn’t fall under the same protection and it might. But being right and being able to fight it to the end in court are two different things.
My sources seem to think the biggest concern is that all firearms instructors, “Mom and Pop” FFLs, and of course libertarian college students with a mischievous streak (borrowing and mangling a phrase from Paul Barrett) will be required to pay the $2000+/year license fees to register with the Department of State. This would be even though there was no technology, products, or training being exported. Just that you’re “in the business” could make you subject to the restrictions and require that you register with the Department of State and pay the annual fee. The government wouldn’t have to directly “stop the signal” in it’s entirety. There a million different signals and they only have to make examples of a few people and most others would want to avoid the hassle and “would lead more compliant lifestyles”. There is very little profit to be made in being a martyr for the cause. The 3-D printer issue could just be noise and a distraction to a much bigger concern.
Ultimately the courts and Congress can probably get most of this straightened out on the side of freedom. If they don’t freedom will be lost to faceless bureaucrats not “blue helmeted elk” that you can shoot at as they go door-to-door confiscating your guns.
In the mean time an enraged narcissist who didn’t get his way with the legislature could conceivably apply the regulations to people posting YouTube videos on how to grip your pistol.
In comments here;
“The bottom line is; we have authoritarians and anti-authoritarians living in the same society. Each is attempting to foster its separate, incompatible doctrine. Neither can afford to tolerate the other.”
It’s more like we’re living as separate societies in the same country, and that we have incompatible world views rather than “doctrines”. Neither world view can tolerate the other, because one example is often capable of poisoning, or infecting, a whole lot of people.
The authoritarian’s fantasy of a glorious regime can be highly threatened by one “upstart” who simply will not be intimidated or fall in line. The ideal of liberty in the minds of anti-authoritarians can be poisoned by the emergence of gangs as they infiltrate the political and media infrastructures.
So far in this post I’ve treated authoritarians and anti-authoritarians as separate but equal, but there is of course a major difference– The anti-authoritarian (libertarian) can best further his goals by being straight forward and honest, while the authoritarian must use deception, fear, anger and doubt.
One is honest and motivated by love while the other is a lying sack of shit motivated by hate trying to appear good and reasonable only as a means of getting its greedy way. One is honest with himself to the greatest extent possible while the other must avoid reality or be exposed and discredited. One builds and provides while the other is a deadly parasite, and yet one can be seen as mocking the other for its selfish goals.
Which are you? Most people are confused on the matter, believing themselves to be one when they are the other. Further; you can at times actually be doing the right things for the wrong reasons. Feints within feints within feints. What a tangled web we weave.
You can dress the conflict up in millions of words, appealing to various motivations and emotions, but it is still that simple, age-old conflict between love and hate, or liberty and tyranny.
Each sees itself as a liberator, too, and again it is because the mere existence of the other is a threat to its own existence. One is poison to the other and so it longs to be free of that poison.
How many ways can we say the same things? Millions and millions and millions. We fool ourselves into playing the same deadly game over and over.
There is nothing celebratory about the fact that two brothers suspected of planting bombs at the finish line of the Boston Marathon a few weeks ago were able to get a gun without a proper permit. This gun was used to kill a police officer.
Despite these morbid realities, the NRA is still celebrating this weekend in the Lone Star State, slowly but surely consigning itself to irrelevance as Americans continue to pressure Congress to do something about gun violence weeks after the Senate’s failure to pass the gun violence prevention bill.
Sen. Richard Blumenthal
May 3, 2013
There’s Nothing To Celebrate: NRA’s Celebratory Atmosphere At National Conference Is Disgusting
[Proper permit? Perhaps legislation should be passed that requires “a proper permit” before high school students can purchase recreation drugs like beer and cigarettes. Blumenthal is a blooming idiot if he does not understand the realities of economics and black markets in a quasi-free society. Or alternatively he is desirous of implementing a tyrannical police state. I can see no other alternatives. I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt and declare him an idiot.
Would it be disgusting if the NAACP and ADL celebrated defeating legislation that would required background checks before their members could get permits to be on public streets after dark? Surely it’s just “common sense” that we don’t want people like that “on the streets” unless they have permission from the government. Right?
Wrong. We are talking about specific enumerated rights. Requiring government permission to exercise a right is to deny that it is a right. And the thing that is disgusting is that we had to even have a debate, let alone a fight, about recognizing that right.
It’s Senator Blumenthal and the anti-freedom people he supports that are consigning themselves to irrelevance. Over 86,000 people showed up at the NRA annual meeting and the NRA has a membership of over 5,000,000. How many show up at the gun control annual meetings? About 50 to 100 for the nations largest anti-gun group. The entire email list of the Brady Campaign is only about 50,000. The Brady Campaign doesn’t even have “members” in the sense that the NRA does.
No matter how you look at what Blumenthal has to say it’s clear he is unfit to hold public office. Instead he should be on the street corner handing out free copies of CPUSA newsletters. It would be more philosophically in alignment with his politics than being a member of the U.S. Senate.—Joe]
I say we meet the democrats halfway on gun control by simply banning all democrats from owning guns. This way we also solve the problem of the mentally unstable and incompetent having access to firearms.
Forrest Sargente
April 30, 2013
Comment to Dems love guns. No, really. Stop laughing.
[H/T to Say Uncle.
I find it funny but I wouldn’t seriously advocate for the infringement of anyone’s specific enumerated rights. Even communists, socialists, or (I repeat myself) democrats.
Although the case could be made that people who self-identify as such are mentally unstable and/or incompetent that is the same argument used by the Soviet Union to send political dissidents to mental institutions. Hence, I think it’s history lesson we don’t need to repeat.—Joe]
Statistics about how often gun-related crimes occur in the population is no evidence against you. That’s collectivist thinking. The choices made by others are irrelevant to the choices that you will make.
People understand the wrongness of collectivist thinking in other cases. They would indignantly reject the idea that a member of a given racial group is under suspicion because 10 percent of those with his skin color commit crimes. But the individualist approach also applies to gun ownership and concealed carrying of guns: group ratios offer no evidence about what a given individual will do.
Harry Binswanger
January 1, 2013
With Gun Control, Cost Benefit Analysis Is Amoral
[Or as Tam said:
Where the hell do you get off thinking you can tell me I can’t own a gun? I don’t care if every other gun owner on the planet went out and murdered somebody last night. I didn’t. So piss off.
A significant and unique component of western civilization is the concept of the individual apart from the tribe/village/collective. This gave us the greatest increase in our standard of living, wealth, and life expectancy in the shortest time the world has ever known. Yet many people want to revert back to a form of society more appropriate for stone age tribes that frequently, when applied to modern conditions, has resulted in brutal dictators, mass starvation, and death camps.
Even more interesting is that in the last 100 years the brutal dictators, mass starvation, and death camps only occurred in societies with gun control (see also Innocents Betrayed). So when the collectivists both insist we join their collective and that we give up our guns I think there are only two questions of, mostly incidental, interest in asking:
Regardless of whether you bother to ask the questions your response should be congruent with Tam’s.—Joe]