Category Archives: Politics

Congressional hearing on gun control

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I usually am pretty well informed on these sort of things. But I didn’t hear about this:

National lawmakers were in Chicago
holding a Congressional hearing on proposed gun control legislation
today.

The Closing the Gun Show Loophole Act would require
private sellers at gun shows to perform background checks before selling
firearms. Illinois passed a similar law in 2005.

Jody Weis is
superintendent of Chicago Police. He says the law should be implemented in all
states.

WEIS: It’s just common sense legislation. I don’t see how anyone
could say this is restrictive when we’re simply asking for a background check if
you’re going to buy a weapon. This is pretty simple to understand.

“Common sense” legislation that raises the price, demands you get government permission, and enables backdoor registration, for a specific, enumerated, constitutionally protected, right.

What do you want to bet the people at the “hearings” only heard what they wanted to hear? Who attended? I can only find the one reference to this hearing which is very short on who we need to vote against in the next election.

And since when do they hold congressional hearings in Chicago? If they are going to hold hearings someplace other than D.C. it’s not surprising they chose Chicago for their gun control get together. If they had held it in Idaho, Arizona, or even Washington state they would have had protesters.

Quote of the day–Neal Knox

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When the ‘reasonable’ Brady Bill was pending, we told the world that radical unreasonable gun laws were waiting in the wings.

We were called paranoid, at best, and liars, at worst–by HCI, Congress, the news media and even some of our fellow gun owners.

Yesterday, Sen. Howard Metzenbaum (D-Ohio), Rep. Charles Schumer and Handgun Control, Inc. proved us right by introducing their ‘comprehensive gun control’ package, H.R. 3932/S. 1886. It is European-style total people control.

It has every provision on the anti-gunners’ wish list short of a total handgun ban. They’re satisfied, for now, with a ban on merely some handguns–for it creates the total registration and licensing system necessary to make an eventual confiscation law work.

The same day Treasury Secretary Lloyd Bentsen announced that they were using the ‘Destructive Devices’ section of the 1968 Gun Control Act to put the ‘non-sporting’ Streetsweeper, Striker and USAS-12 shotguns under the same registration and $200 transfer tax applicable to machine guns under the National Firearms Act.

Neal Knox
March 3, 1994
HCI ‘Kitchen Sink’ Filed
From The Gun Rights War, page 203.
[When someone, like Half-Truth Henigan, from the Brady Campaign (formerly HCI) says there is no “slippery slope” (see chapter three in Henigan book Lethal Logic) remind them of 1994 and what they helped introduce back then.

When some politician tells you the law they are proposing won’t be pushed to the limits and beyond remind them the Treasury Secretary declared some 12-gauge shotguns ‘Destructive Devices’ putting them in the same category as RPGs, Claymore mines, and Bazookas.

And, as I have said before about this book, you shouldn’t read it just before trying to go to sleep. There will be way too much adrenaline in your system for the next few hours.–Joe]

NRA 2010 Washington State endorsements

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I received this nearly a week ago but ended up being very very busy with a lot of travel and attending a wedding and procrastinated far too much.

I did use them for our own family voting in the primary. It should also be of use in the general election.

Before too long I expect there will be more specific things gun rights activists will be tasked with to make sure the legislatures receive the proper message this fall. I’ll be more responsive next time.

Gun cartoon of the day

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It seems to the people on the left believe everything boils down to money/greed. There apparently is no such thing as principles. There are no such thing as inalienable rights. There apparently are no solutions that do not involve more government control. It is apparently inconceivable that less government control could be the solution to the problems they claim to be concerned about.

Either they are either incredibly narrowed minded, incredibly stupid, or incredibly evil. Most are not all that stupid. Other than a few politicians I don’t think they they have that high a percentage of evil in their midst. That leaves narrowed minded.

With such narrow minded and evil people in positions of power our current economic situation should not be a surprise to anyone. The only thing that will surprise me is if the future does not hold a lot of government caused deaths.

The school massacres have been caused by excessive government and the economic collapse, political unrest, and starvation ahead of us will result in many, many more deaths. Will this be the final lesson that will ever need be taught that attempting a socialist/communist utopia is a really, really bad idea? Or is it true…

Quote of the day–Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

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To rule is easy, to govern difficult.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
[I wonder if this contributes to why we have such a terrible situation with our government. Politicians, and to a large extent the populous, want to be rulers when the Constitution and the more Libertarian citizens expect them to direct the affairs and policies of the country within very limited constraints. Those who would be rules see it is easy to be what they want to be and those who would govern within the given limits while managing to take the heat from the press and people who want “money for nothing and chicks for free” realize the job is going to be tough with few thanks.–Joe]

Once Again, Ladies and Gentlemen…

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…Bill Whittle, or rather, not Bill Whittle but an essay written by Bill Whittle.  He’s an excellent writer to be sure, but his work is backed by research which makes it downright valuable.



In fact, in all of human history, there has been only one genuinely progressive, genuinely liberating idea: a lightning bolt across the pages of history – the why in 1776, the how in 1787 – the idea of limited government, god-given rights, personal liberty and rule by the vast collective wisdom and industry of the common man, and not by the bored, pampered and self-hating elites that have run everything before and since. This is a once-in-history idea. This is why we have to conserve it. We have to conserve this fundamentally liberal idea.


That’s our argument.  Ronald Reagan said it in different words, but that’s the come-back to any and all modern “liberals” or “Progressives”.


I was a little disappointed by the lack of mention of education.  Talking with each other, yes, but that bloated, hateful, destructive monster we’ve been accustomed to calling “Public Education” has to go.  Just as our first amendment protects religion from corruption by government, so too must we protect education from corruption by government.  It is every bit as important.  Hillsdale College perhaps shows us one way to do that, but feeding the monster at the same time one is trying to mind one’s own business makes it more difficult.


Whittle wraps it up thusly;



We can do it. And we’re gonna do it.  We are going to whip these communists out of their boots. And starting next time, we’ll start figuring out exactly how.


Ok.  Good.  By all means, read the whole thing.

Quote of the day–Kathleen Strand

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No one needs a semiautomatic weapon on the streets of Chicago, and no convicted felons or domestic abusers need a weapon anywhere in Illinois. These are not questions of constitutional rights — they are questions of public safety and common sense.

Kathleen Strand
August 9, 2010
Spokeswoman for Democratic Senate candidate Alexi Giannoulia.
Mark Kirk supports court’s overturning of gun ban–Alexi Giannoulias opposes ruling used to gut Chicago law
[It’s called The Bill of Rights. Not The List of Sometimes Allowed Needs. And we have nine U.S. Supreme Court Justices that disagree with her.

I think she needs to take a remedial course in U.S. government before she involves herself in any further discussion of politics.–Joe]

We’re All Gonna Die! – Details at Eleven

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This post from Uncle reminded me of John Stossel’s campaign to ban dihydrogen monoxide.  It’s about what I call ignoracracy– control of the people through ignorance, or the “Ignorati”– those who use that tactic.  Stossel got plenty of signatures on his petition.  He told people things like; dihydrogen monoxide, used heavily in industry, corrodes metal, and it kills thousands of people each year including children.  Congress is doing nothing about it!  All totally true of course.


Yellow journalism could be seen as a form of ignoracracy, except that we can turn it off or look away at will.


Education would be the obvious antidote, except that education is owned by the Ignorati.

Gun cartoon of the day

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I wasn’t going to actually use this one. But Bitter’s comment changed my mind.


As Lyle pointed out in the same comment thread advocation of liberty is not something that should be ridiculed or condemned no matter what the source. Yet that appears to be the intent here.

Gun cartoon of the day

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Were there ever any cartoons expressing the view that President Clinton was the puppet of The Brady Campaign? That view certainly would have had more truth to it than President Bush was the puppet of the NRA or Charlton Heston.


But then truth is irrelevant to bigots.

Sex Party

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Sex Party? Did someone say “Sex Party”? Where?

It sounds like the type of party Bill Clinton and Al Gore should belong to instead of the Democrat Party.

Oh, it’s in Australia.

Can we export them?

Obfuscation and Delusion as a Way of Life

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Someone gave us some “tofu milk” and some “vegan rice milk” they didn’t want.  It comes as a powder.  If we run out of real milk, I’ve been mixing up a batch of one or the other for my morning coffee.  It’s not too bad.  If you’re desperate.


Reading the ingredients on the rice milk, I find one of them is “evaporated cane juice”.  Seriously; who are we kidding, hippies?  “Cane juice”?  I’m pretty sure it’s not bamboo we’re talking about.  It must be sugar cane.  That’s right; we don’t like added sugar, but we like the taste, so we’ll use sugar and call it something else.  It’s not sugar.  It’s “evaporated effing cane juice”.  How dare you say otherwise.  What are you, a racist teabagger?


I’ve seen “evaporated cane juice” listed on some hippie kids’ cereal boxes, along with warnings about how corporations hurt animals and kids!


Call it “raw cane sugar” if you want to be accurate.  But no– you don’t want to be accurate.  You want to be deluded.  You want to fool yourself and hope no one else notices.  It feels better.  And instead of “statist” or “totalitarian” you call yourself “progressive”.  That makes it all better, doesn’t it?  Just use the language differently.  Now it all sounds perfectly wonderful, and anyone who calls you on it is a bad person.


Don’t anyone come on here and say I’m being unfair by conflating the use of “evaporated cane juice” with statism.  Note the aforementioned cereal box– it does that all by itself.  The same people who can’t be honest about adding sugar are warning us against corporations (while profiting in selling sugar-laced cereal to kids).  It’s all part of the same culture, people.

Who Knew…

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…that there would be warm water on the surface of the Gulf of Mexico, that there would be sunlight on the Gulf, or microbes in the water?


Experts Surprized…Again.


It seems the major catastrophe that was supposed to happen, that the anti capitalists desperately wanted to happen, isn’t happening.  Damn it!


FYI; Diesel fuel, for example, needs to have preservatives added to it, or it will rot in the tank.  Yes, it’s food for little bugs otherwise.  I know that, ’cause I used to run a diesel car.

Quote of the day–Josh Sugarmann

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The same industry that has given us armor-piercing ‘cop-killer’ bullets, plastic
handguns, and assault weapons has now added caseless ‘phantom’ ammo to its
litany of assaults on public safety. This is just the latest example of the
failure of a system that allows a virtually unregulated industry to develop and
market hazardous products without the pre-market scrutiny afforded almost all
other products in America.

Josh Sugarmann
July 6, 1993
New Technology–Caseless “PHANTOM” Ammo–Could Devastate Police Investigations
[I
remember when this came out. It was the heyday of gun control in this
country. It’s almost hard to believe I’ve been fighting this guy for
over 17 years.

Just like “cop-killer bullets”, “plastic handguns”, and “assault weapons” Sugarmann had to, and still does, deliberately mislead and lie to the public in an attempt achieve his unconstitutional attack on a specific enumerated right.

At
times I still wonder if it was the enabling of better communication by
the Internet, the success of the “assault weapon” ban which awoke the
voters, the emergence of great leaders, or something else that turned
the tide. A “little bird” told me there is a movie being made the
chronicles the gun rights movement of the last 50 years or so. Although I’m more interested in making history
than documenting it does help to review the diplomatic rhetoric and
saber rattling, as well as the skirmishes and battles from time to time.
We can learn about the ways of our enemies and how our heroes both
stumbled and won battles.–Joe]

Quote of the day–Neal Knox

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But Mayor Daley went back to Chicago and pushed through an ordinance individually registering every gun in Cook Country. That ordinance was delayed one day because the U.S. Supreme Court had handed down U.S. vs. Haynes, which held that it was a “justifiable defense” for a criminal, prohibited from possessing a gun, to refuse to register it due to fear of self-incrimination. The Chicago city council found an innovative way to enact their registration ordinance while evading that law: Persons with criminal or mental records which prevented them from legally owning a gun were exempt from registration.

Never mind that criminals were the alleged target of that law, and that they were exempted, the city’s new registration law applied only to the law-abiding citizen with a spotless record. And it’s still the same way.…

One thing the late-Sixties gun laws and attempted gun laws accomplished was to make the state’s gun owners nervous. So when the state’s Constitution was rewritten in 1970, they helped put in a clause guaranteeing that “subject only to the police power, the right of the people to keep and bear arms would not be infringed.” That mean, according to the official documents describing the Constitution, that while guns might be subjected to certain regulations, private ownership of handguns could never be banned.

In 1982, the village of Morton Grove banned handguns. A few months ago the state’s Supreme Court, on a split decision, ruled that the ban didn’t violate the new Constitution. They explained that since Morton Grove residents could still own long guns, the prohibition against banning arms hadn’t been violated.

Neal Knox
December 12, 1983
The Drift Toward Prohibition
From The Gun Rights War, page 80 and 81.
[It’s a great book. But if you are like me you probably shouldn’t read it just before you go to bed because you will end up angry and have difficulty going to sleep.

But it’s interesting to know that the methods and attitudes of the bigots haven’t changed over the last 50 years. They lied, they ignored original constitutional intent, and they wanted to infringe the rights of ordinary citizens even though they claimed they only wanted to make it difficult for criminals to possess firearms.

The difference is that we now have a “won game” (is that phrase used outside of the chess culture?) on our hands now. We just need to keep up the pressure and drive these bigots into political and social oblivion.–Joe]

Quote of the day–John Boccieri

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In these difficult times, it is vital that Congress maintain individuals’ constitutional property rights. Some property rights are secure; clothing, pets, or crops can be deemed exempt from repossession. Other property rights, however, are ignored, most notably 2nd Amendment rights.


In response, I urge you to join me in becoming an original cosponsor of The Protecting Gun Owners in Bankruptcy Act of 2010. The Protecting Gun Owners in Bankruptcy Act of 2010 will allow consumer bankruptcy debtors to exempt firearms from the claims of creditors.  Specifically, the measure would permit firearms held primarily for the personal, family or household use of the debtor to be exempt from the claims of creditors under federal exemption law.


John Boccieri U.S. Representative (Democrat) from Ohio
Letter to Congress June 2010.
[I’m not so sure I like the idea of exempting all firearms from the claims of creditors. I could see some dollar value exemption, like $10K in guns and ammo but not an unlimited number of firearms or dollar value. If someone owed me $100K I would be pretty upset if the debtor could tell the judge the only thing he owned was just this one gun and the judge was required to let the guy keep it rather than pay his debt to me.


On the other hand it’s nice to see politicians (especially Democrats) thinking of ways to curry favor with gun owners. And of course putting Josh Sugarmann at risk of a aneurysm gets a few bonus points from me too.–Joe]

Quote of the day–U.S. Rep. Debbie Halvorson

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We’re one of two states who don’t have concealed carry. Chicago is seeing some of the worst gun violence right now — though it had some of the tightest gun restrictions.

Violence goes down when concealed carry is the law. Illinois should pass common-sense legislation.



U.S. Rep. Debbie Halvorson, D-Crete
July 23, 2010
Gun fight looming — State legislators expected to reload laws
[Yes. Illinois should do that. When I can discreetly carry in Chicago I might actually consider visiting again. The same goes for California, Hawaii, and a few other places that I am interested in visiting.


Notice also the ‘D’ after her name. She is a friend of gun owners even though I’m sure there are some issues we will be the exact opposite of each other. But until the gun issue is settled we can ignore differences. When we have something we agree on we should work together to accomplish things. Don’t look for reasons to reject someone. Look for reasons to take advantage of their offer to help accomplish mutual goals.–Joe]

Quote of the day–Dmitry Orlov

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The mid-1990s did not seem to me as the right time to voice such ideas. The United States was celebrating its so-called Cold War victory, getting over its Vietnam syndrome by bombing Iraq back to the Stone Age, and the foreign policy wonks coined the term “hyperpower” and were jabbering on about full-spectrum dominance. All sorts of silly things were happening. Professor Fukuyama told us that history had ended, and so we were building a brave new world where the Chinese made things out of plastic for us, the Indians provided customer support when these Chinese-made things broke, and we paid for it all just by flipping houses, pretending that they were worth a lot of money whereas they are really just useless bits of ticky-tacky. Alan Greenspan chided us about “irrational exuberance” while consistently low-balling interest rates. It was the “Goldilocks economy” – not to hot, not too cold. Remember that? And now it turns out that it was actually more of a “Tinker-bell” economy, because the last five or so years of economic growth was more or less a hallucination, based on various debt pyramids, the “whole house of cards” as President Bush once referred to it during one of his lucid moments. And now we can look back on all of that with a funny, queasy feeling, or we can look forward and feel nothing but vertigo.


Dmitry Orlov
February 13, 2009
Social Collapse Best Practices
[I had a conversation with a friend earlier this week and he was of the opinion (pharaphrasing) we went from “it was too early to shoot the bastards to it’s too late to do any good and it’s just a matter of riding things out as best we can as we auger into the ground”.


I can’t say that I have any factual basis to refute his assessment.–Joe]

How’s that health care working out for you?

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I heard two different stories on the “health care reform” yesterday. I had lunch with an old friend. He has his own small business and with the downturn in the economy he is slowing sinking. He is looking for a contract job writing software and may end up leaving the Seattle area for a few weeks to “go do some coding in Iowa”. The new health care regulations aren’t helping him any either. He pulled out his Group Health identification card and told me, “I was paying $1000/month for this until they passed the bill. Almost immediately it went to $1500/month.”

That evening I had dinner with some other friends. One of them told me about explaining to one of his employees just yesterday that he is now required to offer her health insurance. He told her, “I’m required to offer you health insurance. So I’m doing that now. But if you accept I’m going to have to cut your hours back to 20 per week. At that point I no longer have to pay your insurance. If you sign this other piece of paper saying you don’t want the coverage you can continue to work 40 hours per week.

She clarified, “So I could work 20 hours per week and not have health insurance or I could continue to work 40 hours per week and not have health insurance, right?” “That’s right”, he said. “Unless you can talk Ruth out of her raise. We just don’t have the budget for any additional expenses.”

As Sebastian rhetorically asks on a slightly different topic, “Who could have predicted this?”

Quote of the day–Fred

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The Brady Campaign tends to act like a rather dumb terrier and grabs on to whatever scrap they can and not let go until they get their way, regardless of how stupid and pointless it is.

Fred
March 27, 2010
Comment to Guns ‘N Coffee
[After failing with Starbucks it appears the latest scrap they are grabbing on to (again) is the “gun show loophole”.–Joe]