Category Archives: Politics

Facts are Being Manipulated

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Tracking crime statistics – and more importantly, whether or not crime is rising or falling in the United States – is getting harder to do. That’s because nearly a third of America’s cities are no longer reporting crime statistics to the FBI.

This is more than just a problem for policymakers looking for data to address the cities most in need of assistance. It also means that some policymakers are demanding bad policy because they’re relying on incomplete data.

The Marshall Project reported that 31 percent of the 18,000 law enforcement agencies across the U.S. failed to report crime data to the FBI’s national database after transitioning to a new data collection system, according to the latest statistics from the FBI. That’s a slight improvement from 2021, when 40 percent of law enforcement agencies didn’t report crime data. Still, it’s a glaring blind spot, especially when that data is missing from some of the largest metro areas dealing with rampant, out-of-control crime.

Many of those cities also happen to be led by the loudest voices calling for gun control, defunding police and soft-on-crime policies. The trifecta means that gun control politicians are missing a third of the crime picture yet demanding 100 percent of the gun control. Typical behavior for zealots who favor government control over individual freedom.

Salam Fatohi
August 10, 2023
AMERICA HAS A CRIME REPORTING PROBLEM

This is concerning. Facts, such as these statistics, are important to us. They are probably not as important as the constitutional protections but they are important. They are unimportant to the antifreedom people unless the facts are in their favor. By failing to report the facts in the cities with the most gun control they can use them to their advantage.

Since the facts are being manipulated, we can hammer them with the fact they are manipulating the facts. Also, it may be we need to rely less on the facts and just hammer them with the legal protections of firearms owners.

Dark Days for Antis’

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When I first was getting involved with the gun rights issue (early 1970s), as I recall gun sales were about 3 million a year. Today it’s over 12 million. The antis’ time has passed.

David Hardy
August 4, 2023
Hurrah! Gun sales over a million a month!

I’m not sure their time has passed. But they certainly know there are dark days in their future.

We have to win the culture war as well as the legal war. Then we can win the political war. Gun sales and gun ownership rates will win us the culture war.

Flawed Logic and Contempt

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The flawed logic of this unconstitutional law is second only to the contempt for which the authors and Gov. Pritzker hold for the constitutionally protected right of the citizens of his state to keep and bear arms.

Lawrence G. Keane
NSSF Senior Vice President
August 16, 2023
Gun Organization Sues Illinois Over New Firearm Restrictions

I’m not sure. I could see the contempt ranking higher.

In other news, August is National Shooting Sports Month.

Biden Administration Demands Power to Censor

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President Joe Biden’s administration in a Monday amicus brief pushed the Supreme Court to rule against Republican-led states’ laws that prevent online censorship.

Florida and Texas have enacted laws to stop Big Tech platforms from censoring content due to viewpoint, and the Biden administration asked for the Supreme Court to review them, according to the brief. Specifically, the Biden administration requested for the Supreme Court to rule against the states’ laws and in favor of social media companies’ right to censor.

Jason Cohen
August 15, 2023
Biden Admin Pushes Supreme Court To Rule Against Red State Laws Blocking Online Censorship

Censorship, except for confidential and similar information, tells you everything you need  to know about individuals as well as governments. If they demand the silence of others it means they are unable to defend their intellectual stance. I.E. they are liars and should be treated appropriately.

Mandated Freedom of Speech Training

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A Texas District Judge ordered Southwest Airlines to send three of its lawyers for religious freedom training after they fired a flight attendant who expressed religious views on social media.

District Judge Brantley Starr ordered on Monday that Southwest has to organize religious freedom training and send a short notice to all its flight attendants regarding the protections on religious speech, after a lawsuit filed by flight attendant Charlene Carter.

Jana J. Pruet
August 12, 2023
Southwest Ordered to Attend Religious Freedom Training

The backlash against wokeness is getting legal backing.

I wonder if other companies are picking up on the message?

I look forward to companies getting court mandated training on respecting people who exercise their rights under the 2nd Amendment.

Three Big Lies

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J6: Republicans stage insurrections without weapons. Their plan was to trespass in one building until they conquered the country.

George Floyd: Sometimes police officers casually and intentionally murder people in front of witnesses who are filming it.

The Big Guy: Didn’t know.

Scott Adams @ScottAdamsSays
Xeeted on August 8, 2023

It is interesting how the framing of the facts changes things so much.

Another Shot Fired at Ferguson

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The Magazine Ban is a complete prohibition on commerce in ammunition magazines capable of holding more than 10 rounds. The Supreme Court has three times answered the specific question of what historical traditions of firearms regulation can possibly support modern day bans on certain types of “arms.” Those cases establish that states can only ban arms that are “dangerous and unusual.” Magazines capable of holding more than 10 rounds are neither.

Joel B. Ard
Ard Law Group PLLC
Attorneys For Plaintiffs
PLAINTIFFS’ MOTION FOR SUMMARY JUDGMENT

Via SAF MOVES FOR SUMMARY JUDGMENT IN WASH. MAGAZINE BAN CASE:

The Second Amendment Foundation today filed a motion in U.S. District Court for summary judgment in its challenge of Washington State’s ban on so-called “large-capacity magazines” in a case known as Sullivan v. Ferguson.

Progress is slow, but we are firing some powerful “ammunition” in our legal war.

I just wish we were in a position to use 18 USC 242 in this fight. Until we are, we will always be doing battle with the forces of evil over this issue.

Quote of the Year!

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If you were unfairly treated by your employer due to posting or liking something on this platform, we will fund your legal bill.

No limit.

Please let us know.

Elon Musk @elonmusk
Xeeted on August 5, 2023

Free speech absolutist? It sounds like it.

This is very cool if it results in the destruction of the cancel culture.

But, of course, it depends on what the definition of “unfair” is. Who is to be the judge of that?

NFA and GCA Will be Gutted

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Because of the Bruen decision we are going to see every gun law challenged, The NFA and GCA will eventually be gutted. I don’t think there will be a complete removal of both but they won’t look anything like they do now after @gunpolicy and GOA get done.

Scott Wilburn (@ScottWilburn138)
Tweeted on August 2, 20237

A persuasive argument can be made for this. If you are in a rational universe. I am far from convinced of the rationality of our legal system, let alone the entirety our country, world, and beyond.

Still, I know that if we do not try it is certain to not happen. So, I’m donating money every month to FPC and SAF. My goal is to have machine gun shooting sports in high schools in less than ten years.

Violent Criminals are Their Allies

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Zero tolerance doesn’t apply to stopping criminals. The Biden administration reserves that focus for the firearm industry.

Larry Keane
Senior vice president for government and public affairs for the National Shooting Sports Foundation
July 27, 2023
ATF has shut down nearly 2,000 gun stores since the implementation of its new “zero tolerance” policy

This is not news to most of us:

They are just being more blatant about it.

The Phallic Symbol is Unattainable

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The phallic symbol is unattainable, yet firearms and, consequently, violence are used to promote white masculinity. Gun advertisements use phallic imagery and language that promotes toxic masculine ideals. Due to the demographics of gun owners, the majority of the consumers of these products are white men. These advertisers know their market well and accurately demonstrated the anxiety white men have in a world where they feel a loss of rights and/or privileges. By using imagery of the phallic symbol, the advertisers have used their consumers’ fears and anxieties in order to sell more firearms, which, in turn, can at least partially demonstrate the white male gun owner’s identity.

Jenna Bergman
August 11, 2021
Firearms and the Phallus: Using Guns to Reclaim Masculinity

It is not only another Markley’s Law Monday, it is another science denier!

And it is not just an attempt at a snarky comment on Twitter. This is an article in the Columbia Political Review. It is Columbia University’s undergraduate multi-partisan political magazine with a circulation of about 8,000.

It is such gibberish that I gave serious consideration to the hypothesis it is satire. I have since dismissed that hypothesis.

Once you see it, you can’t unsee it.

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Government, almost by definition, DOES restrict our freedoms. Those polled aren’t wrong in the least for seeing it that way. The constant struggle is keeping this necessary evil contained to the minimum required for a functioning society.

Orgs like Everytown are part of a broad spectrum of authoritarian social engineers. They want people to be docile, preferably stuffed into cities, owning nothing, and restricted to a narrow Overton window of acceptable opinions and lifestyles. The Chinese social credit system is their model.

Guns are a threat to this (as is free speech, which is why that is also a target for them). Not even really guns themselves, but the individualist ideas they can awaken simply by accepting the natural right to bear arms. Because once you accept the natural rights framework, the Bloombergian government dystopia they want is unacceptable.

Notice how the very same people who want to ban guns also tend to want social media to censor more speech, want the government to tax everything they declare undesirable, want to punish thought crimes with a widening net of “hate speech” restrictions that shutter the Overton window, and constantly find new things they want banned.

This is also why they insist on federal gun laws. They know Boise or Manchester are doing just fine with minimal gun control laws, which drives them insane. It proves the problem in their violent cities is their own fault, and not due to gun rights. The authoritarians can’t allow such counterexamples to exist.

Control, control, control. Once you see it, you can’t unsee it.

Kostas Moros @MorosKostas
Tweeted on July 28, 2023

Right Wing Bias of Corporate Media

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The right wing bias of corporate media is nuts.

David Hogg
Tweeted on July 26, 2023

Delusions are often functional. Especially for anti-gunners like Hogg.

Others have things to say on this topic as well.

Orwellian

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The revenue officers we represent will continue to efficiently and effectively carry out their mission of helping taxpayers meet their lawful tax obligations through other means of communication,

Tony Reardon
National president of the National Treasury Employees Union
July 24, 2023
IRS halts most unannounced visits to taxpayers, citing safety concerns

This has to be the most Orwellian thing I have read outside of an Orwell book.

Via Stephanie who said:

“Knocking on someone’s door today is a different scenario than it was 10 or 15 years ago, and there have been significant reports from IRS employees where they have felt unsafe,” he said.

—

I say it’s a step in the right direction. Thieves should always feel unsafe.

Tyranny of the Minority

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Tyranny of the minority: Liberal law profs urge Biden to defy the courts and the public

“I shall resist any illegal federal court order.”

When “the Court’s interpretation of the Constitution is egregiously wrong,” the president should refuse to follow it.

Those two statements were made roughly 60 years apart. The first is from segregationist Alabama Gov. George Wallace (D). The second was made by two liberal professors this month.

In one of the most chilling developments in our history, the left has come to embrace the authoritarian language and logic of segregationists in calling for defiance and radical measures against the Supreme Court.

In a recent open letter, Harvard law professor Mark Tushnet and San Francisco State University political scientist Aaron Belkin called upon President Joe Biden to defy rulings of the Supreme Court that he considers “mistaken” in the name of “popular constitutionalism.” Thus, in light of the court’s bar on the use of race in college admissions, they argue that Biden should just continue to follow his own constitutional interpretation.

We live in interesting times.

Prepare appropriately.

Catch-22 for Gun Owner Rights

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The Supreme Court granted cert in this case, and it is worrisome. (1) Mr. Rahimi is quite a violent person; (2) if there is any prohibited person category that is likely to fail “text, history, and tradition” standards, it is the one for those subject to civil DV restraining orders. So this is the acid test for Bruen and its standards.

David Hardy
July 11, 2023
Supreme Court case: US v. Rahimi

I’ve been wondering if SCOTUS would “flinch” on this. If they stick to their guns the anti-gun people will gain a tremendous amount of political capital and really be able to sling their poo at SCOTUS and gun owner activists. If they fold and carve an exception to “text, history, and tradition” for people with a history of domestic violence it will be a significant flaw that will likely be exploited by the courts to justify almost any gun control law.

Anti-gun People, Reality, and Truth

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When we had the assault weapons ban in the 90s, only the guys with the tiniest penises cried about it.

the.effing.librarian @effinglibrarian
Tweeted on May 12, 2023

It’s not only another Markley’s Law Monday, it is another science denier!

I don’t know anyone that cried about it. But I know lots of people got angry, politically active, and voted the bums out of office. But expecting anti-gun people to be in touch with reality and/or to tell the truth is a very poor assumption.

You Know Your Friends By Their Enemies

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That the leftist echo chamber in unison is doing everything it can to discredit the movie, the actor, the man who started the group by rescuing children and the group that rescues children should tell you something. They are over the target and laying down truth bombs right and left. The sound of leftist heads exploding…it’s a beautiful thing.

Sheila Stokes
July 16, 2023
THE SOUND OF LEFTIST HEADS EXPLODING

I have nothing to add.

The Last Word Regarding “Try That in a Small Town”

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Him Talking about small town values is not the same thing that your mind controlled dipshit brain filters it as. All you are doing is showing that you’re batshit crazy and that does no good for anyone. If you don’t like the song don’t listen to it. certainly don’t project your insanity on to it. My god you people are INSANE. Maybe check yourself into a facility or something. Liberals in my day protected art and made fun of those that said it had satanic messaging when you play it backwards or shit like that. That’s what you guys are now, the epitome of what you used to hate. Go get help or maybe dicked down and shut the fuck up. thanks.

Roseanne Barr @therealroseanne
Tweeted on July 18, 2023

It is amazing how skilled with words she is. I’m frequently in awe of her.

Liberalism Causes Mental Disorders

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Via a text message from Stephanie:

The Pathologization Pandemic: Why youth mental illness is surging

A 2020 Pew survey of over 10,000 Americans found that self-described liberals aged 18-29 were more likely than self-described conservatives of the same age to report suffering psychological problems over the last week. They were also more than twice as likely to say they’d ever been diagnosed with a mental health disorder. Furthermore, those who were “very liberal” were more likely than those who were just “liberal” to report poor mental health. The group most likely to report poor mental health was young white liberal females, an alarming 56% of whom reported having received a mental illness diagnosis.

Crucially, controlling for worldview narrowed the gender gap considerably: liberal men were more likely to report poor mental health than conservative women. It would seem, then, that the mental health epidemic among girls and young women is associated with their tendency to have a more Left-liberal mindset than boys and young men — a difference that’s becoming more pronounced over time.

Initially I gave this post the title, “Liberalism is a Mental Disorder”. But given the actual content of the article that would have been a stretch. This is the critical thesis of the article:

An analysis of data from 86,138 adolescents found, in line with the Pew survey, that between 2005 and 2018 the self-reported mental health of liberals had deteriorated more than conservatives’, and that this deterioration was worst for girls. The researchers blamed this on “alienation within a growing conservative political climate”. However, the New York Times’ Michelle Goldberg debunked this explanation by pointing out that liberals’ mental health woes began while Obama was in power and as the Supreme Court voted to extend gay marriage rights — hardly a conservative political climate.

A more robust explanation lies in the difference in outlook between liberals and conservatives. Central to Leftism is equality, which is best justified by the idea that people’s fortunes and misfortunes are not their own doing, and therefore undeserved. As such, Leftism de-emphasizes the role of human agency in social outcomes, while overemphasizing the role of environmental circumstances. As the West has shifted culturally Leftward — due to most writers and artists leaning Left — the depiction of people as puppets of their environment has become dominant.

I found the article be very insightful and thought provoking. Perhaps a much more healthy was to reduce the political divide in our country is to encourage a change of  mindset, of all people, not just those we are politically opposition with:

The solution to pathologization, then, lies not in politics but in psychology.

The polar opposite of pathologization is Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT). Although referred to as therapy, it’s closer to a form of mental training. Based on the Ancient Greek philosophy of Stoicism, it teaches a lesson the West has all but forgotten: that our feelings are not always valid, but often deluded and self-destructive. It trains people to overcome harmful emotions by reframing harmful thoughts into alternatives that are more agentic and soluble. So, “That made me angry” becomes “I reacted to that by getting angry.” And “Life sucks” becomes “I feel like life sucks right now.” Where pathologization places problems outside your control, CBT places them within your control. Where pathologization bundles many small issues into one giant insurmountable problem, CBT breaks down giant problems into small manageable pieces.

No approach in psychiatry has been as rigorously tested as CBT, and its effectiveness in restoring agency and reigniting hope is documented by decades of research.

Direct opposition and yelling at each other doesn’t seem to be working. Let’s try something else.