Category Archives: Quote of the Day

Quote of the day—Bret Stephens

Posted on by

I have never understood the conservative fetish for the Second Amendment.

From a law-and-order standpoint, more guns means more murder.

Bret Stephens
October 5, 2017
Repeal the Second Amendment
[Don’t ever let anyone get away with telling you that no one wants to take your guns.

Even if the Second Amendment were to be repealed, the Supreme Court has already said:

This is not a right granted by the Constitution. Neither is it in any manner dependent upon that instrument for its existence. The second amendment declares that it shall not be infringed…

So, the right would still exist even if Stephens could accomplish his desire. And as the repeal date approached you can be sure the preparation for what was to follow would make the previous world’s greatest gun salesmen record look pathetic.

And then Stephens would discover the, probably only, circumstances for which more guns means more murder as some foolish government types attempted to forcibly take those guns from their owners.—Joe]

Quote of the day—Wendell Phillips

Posted on by

Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty; power is ever stealing from the many to the few. The manna of popular liberty must be gathered each day or it is rotten. The living sap of today outgrows the dead rind of yesterday. The hand entrusted with power becomes, either from human depravity or esprit de corps, the necessary enemy of the people. Only by continued oversight can the democrat in office be prevented from hardening into a despot; only by unintermitted agitation can a people be sufficiently awake to principle not to let liberty be smothered in material prosperity.

Wendell Phillips
January 28, 1852
Speech to the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society
[The link about his speech has some interesting history about the frequent misattribution of the “eternal vigilance…” quote.

Also note they had the same problem with democrats then as we do today.—Joe]

Quote of the day—user_4429094

Posted on by

I have no complaint about hunting or target shooting. But “Gun Country” folks often end the conversation there. They try to paint their culture as wholesome, the “real” America. It isn’t. Much of the gun culture is really sick.

user_4429094
October 27, 2017
Comment to Finding common ground on gun control
[This is what they think of you.

Please note that no mention was made of self-defense as being acceptable. There are many people out there who will give you vehement objection to self-defense as a valid reason for firearms ownership.

And they think we are “sick”.—Joe]

Quote of the day—Jeff Snyder

Posted on by

Is your life worth protecting? If so, whose responsibility is it to protect it? If you believe that it is the police’s, not only are you wrong — since the courts universally rule that they have no legal obligation to do so — but you face some difficult moral quandaries. How can you rightfully ask another human being to risk his life to protect yours, when you will assume no responsibility yourself? Because that is his job and we pay him to do it? Because your life is of incalculable value, but his is only worth the $30,000 salary we pay him? If you believe it reprehensible to possess the means and will to use lethal force to repel a criminal assault, how can you call upon another to do so for you?

Jeff Snyder
2001
Nation of Cowards pages 18 and 19
[This essay was originally published in 1993 by The Public Interest.

If I could get an anti-gun person to read just one book it would be Nation of Cowards: Essays on the Ethics of Gun Control. I’m thinking I should buy a few copies and have them handy to give out.—Joe]

Quote of the day—Robert J. Avrech

Posted on by

If only the government and its various agencies possess weapons than the Right to Free Speech becomes an empty promise.

We then live in Orwell’s 1984.

That’s why both Hitler and Stalin passed laws that forbade the private ownership of gun.

Robert J. Avrech
October 25, 2017
Jews With and Without Guns
[I once watched a movie where only the police and the military had guns. It was called Schindler’s List (I forget where I stole this line from).

Also, via Nomen Nescio, “As the old Soviet joke went, everybody in the USSR had freedom of speech, but the law never guaranteed freedom after speech.”

And finally, from Joseph Stalin, “Ideas are far more powerful than guns. We don’t let our people have guns. Why should we let them have ideas?—Joe]

Quote of the day—Helen Thomas

Posted on by

If a person buys guns legally it doesn’t matter how many they have. If the police come to my house to see how many guns I have and I ask what organizations I belong to I’m telling them to go to hell.

Helen Thomas
October 10, 2017
Comment to Tucker vs. Lawyer on Gun Purchases: ‘How Many Should Trigger a Police Visit?’
[I have nothing to add.—Joe]

Quote of the day—John R. Lott Jr.

Posted on by

Last month, the prestigious, bipartisan Texas Lyceum invited me to debate gun control issues. They asked Everytown, the Brady Campaign and the Violence Policy Center if they would participate. Once again, they refused.

Mr. Bloomberg and his groups are unwilling because they don’t want viewers to see their inaccurate information being challenged. They would rather people just take their falsehoods at face value.

John R. Lott Jr.
April 27, 2017
Challenging inaccurate information about guns—A fair debate on the issue is needed, but liberal lobbying groups refuse to participate
[Of course. The truth is toxic to their agenda.—Joe]

Quote of the day—Scott Adams

Posted on by

The way private gun ownership protects citizens is by being a credible threat against all the civilians who might be in any way associated with a hypothetical tyrannical leader who uses the military against citizens. Citizens probably can’t get close to the leaders in such a scenario, but it would take about an hour to round up their families, and the families of supporters.

That would do it.

America is unconquerable.

Scott Adams
October 6, 2017
The Worst Gun Control Arguments
[About an hour? He must be thinking the lists with addresses are already compiled.—Joe]

Quote of the day—Sebastian

Posted on by

On the other side of the argument are the folks on our side who think just shouting “no” very loudly is a legislative strategy. How much impact do you think Ron Paul had on the overall direction of Congress? Because that’s effectively what he did for his whole career. People who do that in deliberative bodies get ignored, and worked around. For these people, the question is this: would you rather sulk in the corner and take solace in the fact that you believe you’re right and righteous as you lose one thing after another, or do you want to actually play the game and win? The latter is what you’re seeing now.

Sebastian
October 25, 2017
What’s Going on With Bump Stocks?
[Principles are, at best, merely guidelines when you are involved in the dirty business of politics.—Joe]

Quote of the day—Peter Gillespie

Posted on by

Get back to the basics. Scrap the outdated constitution. Just a document writted by politicians and the cause of many of the problems in the US.

Peter Gillespie
October 15, 2017
Comment to Tucker vs. Lawyer on Gun Purchases: ‘How Many Should Trigger a Police Visit?’
[How refreshing! A brief flash of honesty and an admission of guilt about his intended goals.

I look forward to his trial.—Joe]

Quote of the day—L. Neil Smith

Posted on by

America was born in a struggle about private weapons. Let them pass—or ratify—any legislation they please.

Americans have obeyed their last gun law.

L. Neil Smith
January 27, 2015
Americans Have Obeyed Their Last Gun Law
[It’s a lot like the laws against marijuana, prohibition of alcohol, and oral sex. Nearly everyone knows they are stupid laws and eventually the laws will go away. In the mean time there are occasions where token compliance is made for appearance sake and to avoid hassles. And of course we have to put up with the whining of self appointed busybodies.

But, yeah, most of the gun laws are so ridiculous most people I know just go about their business and ignore the stupid.—Joe]

Quote of the day—The Wildebeest @wildebeest4160

Posted on by

the only infringement from taking your AR 15 is your penis shrinking

The Wildebeest @wildebeest4160
Tweeted on October 20, 2017
[It’s another Markley’s Law Monday!

It’s very telling that our opposition resorts to childish insults and we have Supreme Court decisions.

Via a tweet from BFD @BigFatDave —Joe]

Quote of the day—Bruce Schneier

Posted on by

The market can’t fix this. Markets work because buyers choose between sellers, and sellers compete for buyers. In case you didn’t notice, you’re not Equifax’s customer. You’re its product.

Bruce Schneier
September 13, 2017
On the Equifax Data Breach
[I agree with his astute observation but not his conclusion (government legislation is required).

If someone is harmed by the carelessness of another the careless person can, and rightly so, be sued for damages. How is this any different?—Joe]

Quote of the day—Ryan Born

Posted on by

When conservatives appeal to “free speech,” it is actually a calculated political move, designed to open up avenues of political discourse while shaming others from moving in active political opposition. I argue that when conservatives resort to this move, they can be safely ignored, as they are appealing to a right that does not exist. In my belief, when conservative ideas are opposed, there is no right that is being infringed.

Ryan Born
September 25, 2017
Speech is free
[At first I though Born was setting up a straw man with “it is actually a calculated political move….”. But that hypothesis was blow away in the following sentence.

Born needs to retake a junior high class on U.S. government and receive a passing grade before attempting to have a conversation with adults. In the mean time don’t ever forget this is what many people on the political left think of specific enumerated rights.—Joe]

Quote of the day—Leonard Pitts

Posted on by

A 2014 Pew Research Center study found that the percentage of Democrats and Republicans holding extremely negative views of the opposite party has more than doubled since 1994; Pew also found that, while 64 percent of Republicans in ’94 held opinions that were to the right of the average Democrat, these days 92 percent do. And 94 percent of Democrats are now to the left of the GOP median.

So the right is moving further right, the left, further left and the center, as the poet Yeats observed, “cannot hold.”

…

What other option, then, do Democrats have but to move left, exploiting the anger, energy and enthusiasm to be found there?

Leonard Pitts
October 16, 2017
Democrats need to move left
[Yes. That should work nicely. Advocating for the policies of Venezuela and Cuba will play so well in the GOP advertisements.

I find it very telling that the option of liberty and adherence to the constitutional limits of government doesn’t even cross his mind. Laws and principles are for suckers. The only thing of importance is restoring power to “his people”.—Joe]

Quote of the day—Dana Loesch‏ @DLoesch

Posted on by

Spent my weekend preparing to move due to repeated threats from gun control advocates.

One guy hunted down my private cell phone number, called when police were here, threatened to shoot me in my front yard. Another guy created a string of social media accounts, posted photos of my house, threatened to rape me to death. Another gun control advocate, after threatening to hunt me down and assault me, dragged my kids into it.

Dana Loesch‏ @DLoesch
Tweeted on October 15, 2017
[Violence. It’s the nature of the political left.

The scumbags of the political left did the same sort of thing to Michelle Malkin a few years ago. (I suspect it continues to this day). I set up a honey pot for catching those threatening Malkin. The link below is another honeypot. If you link to it from your website/blog using the appropriate text it will get more Google Page Rank and appear closer to the top of search engine results.

Dana Loesch’s address and phone number.—Joe]

Quote of the day—Carl Bussjaeger

Posted on by

If even one-half of one percent of the noncompliant shoot back, that’s 30,000 to 450,000 shooters (depending on the scenarios above).

Please recall that Pennington’s little trip down Tyranny Lane started with — as of latest claims — a single shooter killing 58 and wounding hundreds — in approximately ten minutes.

So tell us: How will you achieve your two-gun goal?

Who will bell the cat?

Carl Bussjaeger
October 17, 2017
Belling the cat
[I have done related analysis and came up with similar conclusions.—Joe]

Quote of the day—Michael Moore

Posted on by

As over 90% of gun violence is committed by men, in order for a man to purchase a gun, he must first get a waiver from his current wife, plus his most recent ex-wife, or any woman with whom he is currently in a relationship (if he’s gay, he must get the waiver from his male spouse/partner). This law has greatly reduced most spousal/domestic gun murders in Canada.

• All automatic and semi-automatic guns are banned.

• No gun or clip can hold more than 6 bullets.

• To activate a gun for it to be used, the trigger must recognize the fingerprint of its registered owner. This will eliminate most crimes committed with a gun as 80% of these crimes are done with a stolen gun.

• One’s guns must be stored at a licensed gun club or government-regulated gun storage facility. Believing that having a gun in your home provides you with protection is an American myth. People who die from a home invasion make up a sad but minuscule .04% of all gun murders in the US. And over a third of them are killed by their own gun that the criminal has either stolen or wrestled from them.

Michael Moore
Facebook post on October 4, 2017
[Other than recognizing that Moore is out of touch with the real world of facts the important takeaway is that you should never let anyone get away with telling you that no one wants to take your guns.—Joe]

Quote of the day—Derek Hunter

Posted on by

Imagine there has been a horrible case of child abuse in your neighborhood. A large family with 10 children had parents who brutally beat their kids, and two died. In reacting to that horrendous news, there’s a knock at your door. It’s your mayor and police chief.

“I understand you have two children in this house. Is that correct?” the mayor asks.

“Yes, that’s true. Why?” you reply.

“We’re going to need to see them, to inspect them to make sure they haven’t been subjected to abuse by you,” the chief says.

“Wait, what? You’re not going to inspect my children,” you respond.

“We are going to. And we’re going to monitor your kids from here on out, stopping by periodically to check on them, inspect their bodies for bruises and have them talk to a psychologist to make sure they aren’t being emotionally abused either,” the chief shoots back.

“What the hell gives you the right to do that?” you ask.

“After the horrible abuse that took place a few blocks away, we decided that we had to insert ourselves into the lives of all parents to prevent that from happening ever again,” the mayor says. “So we’ve passed a new law that says we can curtail parental rights for the greater good. Now go get your children.”

Derek Hunter
October 5, 2017
After Las Vegas, Democrats Send In The Clowns
[The sad/scary part of this is this that public education is a significant step in this direction and there are policies which show we are on this path.—Joe]

Quote of the day—Kurt Schlichter

Posted on by

In recent years we’ve seen a remarkable antipathy for the fact that normal Americans even have rights among those on the left. We should have this conversation to clear the air before leftists push too far and the air gets filled with smoke. But we really don’t need to have a conversation about our rights to keep and bear arms. They’re rights. There’s nothing to talk about.

Kurt Schlichter
October 5, 2017
Nothing Makes Liberals Angrier Than Us Normals Insisting On Our Rights
[This should be enough “conversation” but Schlichter extends the conversation with examples and more saying “No.”—Joe]